“…Extracting energetic carriers from light absorption in so-called hot carrier Schottky barrier (SB) junctions has attracted enormous attention, as it allows harvesting low photon energies that have so far been omitted from semiconductor photodetectors. − Since metals offer zero bandgap energy, their operation can in principle cover visible, mid-infrared, terahertz, and microwave regimes, which holds great promises for gas detection, , imaging sensors, wavelength determination, , power monitoring, and sustainable power supplies. − Taking silicon photodetectors (with a bandgap energy of 1.1 eV) for instance, exploitation of SB devices can result in a highly integrated CMOS-compatible and inexpensive alternative to commercially used germanium (Ge) and gallium arsenide (GaAs) photodetectors at telecommunication wavelengths. − ,− , SB junctions consist of a metal–semiconductor (SC) contact where the difference in the work function of both materials leads to an energy band bending at the interface due to Fermi energy alignment on both sides via charge carrier diffusion and generation currents . However, this holds true only when the dipole at the interface generated by surface defects is not taken into consideration.…”