Photoinduced Negative Differential Resistivity and Gunn Oscillations in SrTiO3

Abstract SrTiO₃, a perovskite oxide, holds significant potential for application in the field of oxide electronics. Notably, its photoelectric activity in the low temperature regime, which overlaps with the quantum paraelectric state, exhibits remarkable characteristics. In this study, it is demonstrated that when photo‐excited with above band gap energy photons, SrTiO₃ exhibits non‐linear transport of photocarriers and voltage‐controlled negative resistance, resulting from an intervalley transfer of photo‐induced electrons. As a consequence of the negative resistance, the photocurrent becomes unstable and spontaneously gives rise to low frequency Gunn‐like oscillations.