The optical properties (inter-band absorption, intra-band absorption) of a recently proposed structure (twinning superlattices) in diamond-type and zincblende-type semiconductors were calculated. It was found that the conduction-band intra-band absorption was rather weak, but that the intra-band absorption between the valence-band states was rather high. Direct (phonon-less) inter-band absorption, in twinning superlattices which were based upon indirect gap semiconductors such as Ge, was also found to be possible.

Z.Ikonic, G.P.Srivastava, J.C.Inkson: Physical Review B, 1995, 52[19], 14078-85