Okhyun Nam

Crystal-polarity dependence of Ti/Al contacts to freestanding n-GaN substrate

The effect of crystal polarity on the electrical properties of Ti/Al contacts to n-GaN substrate has been investigated. The Ti/Al contacts prepared on Ga-face n-GaN substrate became ohmic with a contact resistivity of 2×10−5 Ω cm2 after annealing at temperatures higher than 600 °C for 30 s. On the contrary, the contacts on N-face n-GaN substrate exhibited nonlinear current–voltage curve and high Schottky barrier heights over 1 eV were measured at the same annealing conditions. These results could be explained by opposite piezoelectric-field at GaN/AlN heterostructure resulted from different polarity of the GaN substrate.

Low resistance and reflective Mg-doped indium oxide-Ag ohmic contacts for flip-chip light-emitting diodes

We have investigated an Mg-doped In/sub x/O/sub y/(MIO)-Ag scheme for the formation of high-quality ohmic contacts to p-type GaN for flip-chip light-emitting diodes (LEDs). The as-deposited sample shows nonlinear current-voltage (I--V) characteristics. However, annealing the contacts at temperatures of 330/spl deg/C-530/spl deg/C for 1 min in air ambient results in linear I--V behaviors, producing specific contact resistances of 10/sup -4/--10/sup -5/ /spl Omega//spl middot/cm/sup 2/. In addition, blue LEDs fabricated with the MIO-Ag contact layers give forward-bias voltages of 3.13-3.15 V at an injection current of 20 mA. It is further shown that LEDs made with the MIO-Ag contact layers give higher output power compared with that with the Ag contact layer. This result strongly indicates that the MIO-Ag can be a promising scheme for the realization of high brightness LEDs for solid-state lighting application.

High-power GaN-based blue-violet laser diodes with AlGaN∕GaN multiquantum barriers

AlGaN∕GaN multiquantum barriers (MQBs) were introduced into violet AlInGaN laser diodes with an InGaN multiquantum-well structure, resulting in drastic improvements in lasing performance. Comparing with conventional AlGaN single electron blocking layer (EBL), lower threshold current of 32mA and higher slope efficiency of 1.12W∕A at room temperature has been achieved by using the AlGaN∕GaN multiquantum barrier. This improvement implies that p-type AlGaN∕GaN MQBs are more effective in suppressing the overflow of electrons than p-type AlGaN single EBL. Effective barrier heights of the MQBs should be higher than the single EBL due to the quantum effect of MQBs and the enhancement of p-type doping efficiency. Additionally, the effect of strain on InGaN multiquantum wells from the single EBL can be reduced by using the AlGaN∕GaN MQBs structure.

Low-resistance and highly-reflective Zn–Ni solid solution/Ag ohmic contacts for flip-chip light-emitting diodes

We have investigated a Zn–Ni solid solution/Ag scheme for use in producing high-quality ohmic contacts for flip-chip light-emitting diodes (LEDs). The as-deposited contact shows nonlinear I–V characteristics. However, oxidizing the contacts at temperatures of 350–550 °C for 1 min in air ambient results in linear I–V behaviors, yielding specific contact resistances of 10−4–10−5 Ω cm2. In addition, LEDs are fabricated with the oxidized Zn–Ni solid solution/Ag contacts and Ag single contacts. The typical I–V characteristics of the LEDs with the annealed Zn–Ni solid solution (2.5 nm)/Ag (200 nm) p-type contact layers reveal a forward-bias voltage of 3.25 V at an injection current of 20 mA, which is much better than that of the LEDs with the Ag (200 nm) contact layers.

Characteristic of InGaN/GaN Laser Diode Grown by a Multi-Wafer MOCVD System

InGaN/GaN multi-quantum well (MQW) laser diodes (LDs) were grown on c-plane sapphire substrates using a multi-wafer MOCVD system. The threshold current for pulsed lasing was 1.6 A for a gain-guided laser diode with a stripe of 10 × 800 μm 2 . The threshold current density was 20.3 kA cm −2 and the threshold voltage was 16.5 V. The optical power ratio of transverse electric mode to transverse magnetic mode was found to be greater than 50. The characteristic temperature measured from the plot of threshold current versus measurement temperature was between 130 and 150K.

Measurement of junction temperature in GaN-based laser diodes using voltage-temperature characteristics

We present a method to determine junction temperature in GaN-based laser diodes (LDs) for simple, fast, and reliable characterization of thermal properties. The large change of forward operation voltage with temperature in GaN laser diodes is advantageously used to measure junction temperature. Using this method, we compare junction temperature of LD structures with different substrates and chip mounting methods. It is found that the junction temperature can be reduced considerably by employing GaN substrates or epi-down bonding. For epi-down bonded LDs, as much as two-fold reduction in junction temperature is achieved compared to epi-up bonded ones and junction temperature rise in this case is only about 13 degrees for more than 100 mW-output power.

Crystal tilting in GaN grown by pendoepitaxy method on sapphire substrate

Pendeoepitaxy of GaN on sapphire substrate with SiO2 mask is demonstrated and characterized by transmission electron microscopy and double crystal x-ray diffraction. A continuous layer of GaN with low dislocation density was achieved by this method. Parts of the GaN layer are tilted symmetrically toward [11-20] direction and have two kinds of coalesce and tilt boundaries. Each boundary was formed by a vertical array of piled up dislocations with the Burger’s vector of [11-20]. The tilting mechanism in pendeo-epitaxy is discussed in terms of surface interaction between the SiO2 mask and ELO-GaN.

Abnormal dependence of contact resistivity on hole concentration in nonalloyed ohmic contacts to p-GaN

The dependence of contact resistivity on hole concentration has been investigated for nonalloyed Pd contacts to p-GaN. The hole concentration was varied by changing the Mg concentration, [Mg], in p-GaN. The p-GaN having the [Mg] of 4.5×1019 cm−3 showed the hole concentration of 2.2×1017 cm−3, where contact resistivity was measured as 8.9×10−2 Ω cm2. When the [Mg] increased to 1.0×1020 cm−3, the hole concentration was significantly reduced to 2.0×1016 cm−3. Nevertheless, the Pd contacts on the p-GaN displayed contact resistivity as low as 5.5×10−4 Ω cm2. The abnormal dependence of contact resistivity on hole concentration may be explained by predominant current flow at the Pd/p-GaN interface through a deep level defect band, rather than the valence band.

Carrier loss and luminescence degradation in green-light-emitting InGaN quantum wells with micron-scale indium clusters

Influence of the size of indium clusters on optical properties of green-light-emitting InGaN quantum wells (QWs) was investigated by photoluminescence (PL), cathodoluminescence, PL excitation, and time-resolved PL techniques. Low luminescence efficiency was observed for green-light-emitting InGaN QWs with micron-sized indium clusters, in contrast to the case of InGaN QWs with submicron-sized small indium segregation. Both the thermal activation energy and the carrier lifetime dramatically decreased, while a large Stokes-like shift between absorption edge and PL peak energy was still observed for the InGaN QWs with micron-sized indium clusters. These facts indicate that the effective potential barrier between radiative and nonradiative channels (thus effective carrier localization) rapidly decreases due to the formation of micron-sized large indium clusters possessing a number of nonradiative centers, leading to significant luminescence degradation.

High-Performance Blue InGaN Laser Diodes With Single-Quantum-Well Active Layers

The authors report on the high-performance blue laser diodes (LDs) with an emission wavelength of ~448 nm employing InGaN single-quantum-well (QW) active layers. At 100-mW continuous-wave (CW) output power, operation current and voltage are, respectively, 150 mA and 5.3 V, corresponding to the wall plug efficiency of >12%, a record value for the single-mode InGaN LDs with blue wavelengths. The single QW blue LD showed normal temperature dependence of light output-current curves with the characteristic temperature of 170 K. In addition, we demonstrate a high level of catastrophic optical damage of >300 mW and long device lifetime under CW operation condition at room temperature.