Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mphil-in-micro-and-nanotechnology-enterprise-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2022/paper-2/section-b/21/ii/e/solution

Scanning tunneling microscopy uses electron tunnelling between a conducting tip and a sample across a narrow vacuum gap. At fixed bias, the strong distance dependence of the current enables sensitive height or electronic-structure measurements; the result depends on local electronic states as well as topography.
A tunnel diode uses tunnelling between occupied and available states across a very thin, heavily doped semiconductor junction. The alignment of those states changes with bias and can produce a region of negative differential resistance, useful in fast switching or oscillation circuits. Both examples require a finite barrier with states available on the other side; an infinitely extended forbidden region is not an equivalent transport geometry.

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