S. S. Park

Breakdown voltage and reverse recovery characteristics of free-standing GaN Schottky rectifiers

Schottky rectifiers with implanted p/sup +/ guard ring edge termination fabricated on free-standing GaN substrates show reverse breakdown voltages up to 160 V in vertical geometry devices. The specific on-state resistance was in the range 1.7-3.0 /spl Omega//spl middot/cm/sup 2/, while the turn-on voltage was /spl sim/1.8 V. The switching performance was analyzed using the reverse recovery current transient waveform, producing an approximate high-injection, level hole lifetime of /spl sim/15 ns. The bulk GaN rectifiers show significant improvement in forward current density and on-state resistance over previous heteroepitaxial devices.

Ga Vacancies as Dominant Intrinsic Acceptors in GaN Grown by Hydride Vapor Phase Epitaxy

Positron annihilation measurements show that negative Ga vacancies are the dominant acceptors in n-type gallium nitride grown by hydride vapor phase epitaxy. The concentration of Ga vacancies decreases, from more than 1019 to below 1016 cm−3, as the distance from the interface region increases from 1 to 300 μm. These concentrations are the same as the total acceptor densities determined in Hall experiments. The depth profile of O is similar to that of VGa, suggesting that the Ga vacancies are complexed with the oxygen impurities.

Yellow and green luminescence in a freestanding GaN template

We have studied a broad photoluminescence band in high-mobility freestanding 200-μm-thick GaN template prepared by hydride vapor-phase epitaxy. Variable-excitation intensity and energy experiments showed two defect-related bands: a yellow luminescence (YL) band at about 2.15 eV and a green luminescence (GL) band at about 2.43 eV. In contrast to epitaxial GaN samples prepared by both vapor-phase and molecular-beam epitaxy, the YL in the sample studied is weak and can be easily saturated. However, the GL is dominant. We attribute the GL to isolated defects involving gallium vacancies and the YL to the same defect, but bound to dislocations, or possibly to structural surface defects.

Photoluminescence of GaN grown by molecular-beam epitaxy on a freestanding GaN template

Photoluminescence (PL) studies were performed on a 1.5-μm-thick GaN layer grown by molecular-beam epitaxy on a freestanding GaN template that in turn was grown by hydride vapor-phase epitaxy. PL spectra from both the epilayer and the substrate contain a plethora of sharp peaks related to excitonic transitions. We identified the main peaks in the PL spectrum. Taking advantage of the observation of donor bound exciton peaks and their associated two-electron satellites, we have determined the binding energies of two distinct shallow donors (28.8 and 32.6 meV), which are attributed to Si and O, respectively.

Optical properties of GaN grown by hydride vapor-phase epitaxy

High-quality free-standing GaN was obtained by hydride vapor-phase epitaxy (HVPE) growth and the subsequent removal of the sapphire substrates. In the photoluminescence (PL) spectra of the as-grown HVPE-GaN, we observed a strong phonon replica peak for temperatures higher than 80 K. Both the near-band-edge emission and the yellow emission in the cathodoluminescence spectra were inhomogeneous, and correlated with the crystalline structure. With the homoepitaxial regrowth by metal–organic chemical-vapor deposition (MOCVD) in the GaN substrates, these unusual optical properties were no longer observed and the PL peak became sharper than GaN grown by MOCVD on sapphire substrates, indicating that the free-standing GaN is suitable as substrates for the growth of device structures.

Characteristics of free-standing hydride-vapor-phase-epitaxy-grown GaN with very low defect concentration

A free-standing 300-μm-thick GaN template grown by hydride vapor phase epitaxy has been characterized for its structural and optical properties using x-ray diffraction, defect delineation etch followed by imaging with atomic force microscopy, and variable temperature photoluminescence. The Ga face and the N face of the c-plane GaN exhibited a wide variation in terms of the defect density. The defect concentrations on Ga and N faces were about 5×105 cm−2 for the former and about 1×107 cm−2 for the latter. The full width at half maximum of the symmetric (0002) x-ray diffraction peak was 69 and 160 arc sec for the Ga and N faces, respectively. That for the asymmetric (10–14) peak was 103 and 140 arc sec for Ga and N faces, respectively. The donor bound exciton linewidth as measured on the Ga and N faces (after a chemical etching to remove the damage) is about 1 meV each at 10 K. Instead of the commonly observed yellow band, this sample displayed a green band, which is centered at about 2.44 eV.

Effects of hydrostatic and uniaxial stress on the Schottky barrier heights of Ga-polarity and N-polarity n-GaN

We report measurements of the Schottky barrier heights of Ni/Au contacts on Ga-polarity and N-polarity n-GaN under hydrostatic pressure and applied in-plane uniaxial stress. Under hydrostatic pressure the two different polarities of GaN yield significantly different rates of Schottky barrier height increase with increasing pressure. Uniaxial stress parallel to the surface affects the Schottky barrier height only minimally. The observed changes in barrier height under stress are attributed to a combination of band structure and piezoelectric effects.

Transient photoluminescence of defect transitions in freestanding GaN

Deep level defects responsible for the 2.4 eV photoluminescence (PL) band in a freestanding GaN template were studied by transient photoluminescence. A nonexponential decay of PL intensity observed at low temperature is attributed to a donor–acceptor pair recombination involving a shallow donor and a deep acceptor. At room temperature, a single-exponential PL decay with a lifetime of 30 μs was observed at the high-energy side of the band, whereas the second component with a lifetime of about 750 μs was detected at the low-energy side of the band. The PL decay and transformation of the PL spectrum at room temperature can be explained by transitions from the conduction band to two deep acceptors. Electron-capture cross section has been estimated as 4×10−21 and 10−19 cm2 for the yellow and green bands, respectively, contributing to the broad 2.4 eV band.

160-A bulk GaN Schottky diode array

Pt Schottky rectifier arrays were fabricated on 200-μm-thick, freestanding GaN layers. Even with the reduced dislocation density in these layers (∼105 cm−2) relative to conventional GaN on sapphire (>108 cm−2), rectifiers fabricated on the freestanding GaN show a strong dependence of reverse breakdown on contact diameter. We show that by interconnecting the output of many (∼130) smaller (500 μm×500 μm) rectifiers, we can achieve high total forward output current (161 A at 7.12 V), low forward turn-on voltage of ∼3 V, and maintain the reverse breakdown voltage. The on/off ratio of the rectifier array was ∼8×107 at 5 V/−100 V.

High mobility in n-type GaN substrates

High peak electron mobilities were observed in freestanding c-plane GaN layers. Two well-defined electrical layers, a low mobility degenerate interface layer, and a high mobility nondegenerate bulk layer, were present in these samples. The carrier concentrations and mobilities for the layers were extracted using two methods: (1) magnetic field dependent Hall effect analysis; and (2) a simple two layer Hall model with the assumption that one of the layers is degenerate. The electron Hall mobility of the bulk layer is found to peak at nearly 8000 cm2/V s at low temperature using the magnetic field dependent Hall effect analysis.