Magnetotransport Properties and Subband Structure of the Two-Dimensional Electron Gas in the Inversion Layer of Hg1-xCdxTe Bicrystals

The electronic and magnetotransport properties of conduction electrons in the grain boundary interface of p-type Hg1-xCdxTe bicrystals are investigated. The results clearly demonstrate the existence of a two-dimensional degenerate n-type inversion layer in the vicinity of the grain boundary. The observed quantum oscillations of the magnetoresistivity result from a superposition of the Shubnikov-de Haas effect in several occupied electric subbands. The occupation of higher subbands is presumable depending on the total carrier density ns of the inversion layer. Electron densities, subband energies, and effective masses of these electric subbands in samples with different total densities are determined. The effective masses of lower subbands are markedly different from the band edge values of the bulk material, their values decrease with decreasing electron density and converging to the bulk values at lower densities. This agrees with predictions of the triangular potential well model and a pronounced nonparabolicity of the energy bands in Hg1-xCdxTe. At high magnetic fields (B > 10 T) it is experimentally verified that the Hall resistivity xy is quantized into integer multiplies of h/e2