Indium phosphide

Indium phosphide (InP) is a binary semiconductor composed of indium and phosphorus. It has a face-centered cubic ('zincblende') crystal structure, identical to that of GaAs and most of the III-V semiconductors. Indium phosphide (InP) is a binary semiconductor composed of indium and phosphorus. It has a face-centered cubic ('zincblende') crystal structure, identical to that of GaAs and most of the III-V semiconductors. Indium phosphide can be prepared from the reaction of white phosphorus and indium iodide at 400 °C., also by direct combination of the purified elements at high temperature and pressure, or by thermal decomposition of a mixture of a trialkyl indium compound and phosphine. InP is used in high-power and high-frequency electronics because of its superior electron velocity with respect to the more common semiconductors silicon and gallium arsenide. It was used with indium gallium arsenide to make a record breaking pseudomorphic heterojunction bipolar transistor that could operate at 604 GHz. It also has a direct bandgap, making it useful for optoelectronics devices like laser diodes. The company Infinera uses indium phosphide as its major technological material for manufacturing photonic integrated circuits for the optical telecommunications industry, to enable wavelength-division multiplexing applications. InP is also used as a substrate for epitaxial indium gallium arsenide based opto-electronic devices.