Nature of the Band Gap of In₂O₃ Revealed by First-Principles Calculations and X-Ray Spectroscopy

Bulk and surface sensitive x-ray spectroscopic techniques are applied in tandem to show that the valence band edge for In₂O₃ is found significantly closer to the bottom of the conduction band than expected on the basis of the widely quoted bulk band gap of 3.75 eV. First-principles theory shows that the upper valence bands of In₂O₃ exhibit a small dispersion and the conduction band minimum is positioned at Γ. However, direct optical transitions give a minimal dipole intensity until 0.8 eV below the valence band maximum. The results set an upper limit on the fundamental band gap of 2.9 eV.