New Photothermal Deflection Method to Determine Thermal Properties of Bulk Semiconductors

5th International Conference on Diffusion in Solids and Liquids (DSL-2009)International audienceIn this paper, we present a new Photothermal Deflection Technique (PTD) to determine thermal properties of bulk doped or undoped semiconductor such as GaAs, GaSb, InAs, etc. The method proposed here consists in covering the sample with a thin graphite layer in order to increase the photothermal signal and to ovoid any reflection on the sample surface. This method deals with the analysis of the logarithm of amplitude and phase variation of the photothermal signal versus square root modulation frequency where the sample placed in air is heated by a modulated light beam coming from a halogen lamp. So the best coincidence between experimental curves and corresponding theoretical ones gives simultaneously the best values of thermal conductivity and thermal diffusivity of the sample. These obtained values are in good agreement with those found in literature. The advantage of applying this method in this way lies in its simplicity and its sensibility to both thermal conductivity and thermal diffusivity