T. J. Eustis

Ultra-low resistive ohmic contacts on n-GaN using Si implantation

Implanted ohmic contacts were made on molecular beam epitaxy grown GaN materials. Si was implanted at a doping density of about 4×1020  cm-3 to decrease the contact resistance of the contact, followed by an activation anneal at 1150 °C for 30 s. The overlay metal Ti/Au was evaporated. Four-probe measurements were performed on transmission line model patterns. The measured maximum contact resistance was 0.097 Ω mm and the apparent specific contact resistance was 3.6×10−8 Ω cm2.

High-frequency AlGaN/GaN polarization-induced high electron mobility transistors grown by plasma-assisted molecular-beam epitaxy

High-quality AlGaN/GaN heterostructures have been grown on sapphire substrates by plasma-assisted molecular-beam epitaxy. Polarization effects are exploited to achieve a two-dimensional electron-gas sheet density of 8.8×1012 cm−2 and greater on intentionally undoped material with a measured room-temperature mobility as high as 1478 cm2/V s. Transistors were then fabricated from this material, yielding a unity current gain frequency of 50 GHz and a unity power gain frequency of 97 GHz. By increasing the buffer layer thickness, output powers of 1.88 W/mm at 4 GHz with an efficiency of 34% were achieved. These results prove that the polarization effects in the nitrides are as enormous as theory predicts. The key to the improved mobility and operation of the devices of the all-molecular-beam-epitaxy-grown material, the AlN nucleation layer, will be discussed.

Molecular beam epitaxial growth of normal and inverted two-dimensional electron gases in AlGaN/GaN based heterostructures

Two-dimensional electron gases in AlGaN/GaN heterostructures grown by plasma induced molecular beam epitaxy have been formed by polarization induced interface charge effects. Growth of the “normal” structure (AlGaN on GaN) has formed a two-dimensional electron gas confined in the GaN when grown on sapphire with an AlN nucleation layer, SiC (Si face), or on GaN nucleated by organometallic vapor phase epitaxy on sapphire. Hall mobilities in GaN for normal interfaces are as high as 1238 cm2/V s at 300 K and 3182 cm2/V s at 77 K. Direct current results from field effect transistors fabricated from this material yield a maximum transconductance of 210 mS/mm and a current density of 710 mA/mm. Microwave measurements gave a ft of 27 GHz and a fmax of 37 GHz. When nucleating GaN directly on sapphire, an “inverted” structure (GaN on AlGaN) was used to create a two-dimensional electron gas. The difference in the normal and inverted structures is the polarity of the (Al)GaN layers. The flipping of the (Al)GaN polari...

Polarity determination by atomic location by channeling-enhanced microanalysis

In this letter, an alternative approach to determine the polarity of GaN thin films based on the atomic location by channeling-enhanced microanalysis technique is described. Theoretical calculations provide a straightforward criterion for polarity determination that is a major advantage of this method. At the Bragg position, the thickness-averaged incident electron intensity, and hence, electron induced characteristic x-ray yield, is higher on the N plane than on the Ga if the g vector of the diffraction beam is parallel to the Ga–N bond direction, and vice versa. Experimental results support the theoretical predictions. The possible errors in the experiments are also discussed.

Low temperature scanning tunneling microscope-induced luminescence of GaN

We report the low temperature scanning tunneling microscope-induced luminescence of molecular beam epitaxy grown α-GaN. Semiquantitative spectroscopic analysis suggests near band edge emission, as well as emission covering the rest of the visible range. The relative intensity of band edge emission increases by one order of magnitude under liquid helium cooling. We also report the first photon emission images of GaN obtained with this technique. These images reveal stronger band edge emission at the center of crystallites. This study is complemented with a scanning electron microscope-induced cathodoluminescence analysis. Cathodoluminescence is dominated by the hexagonal (D°, X) transition and reveals evidence of small quantities of the cubic phase.

GaN/SiC heterojunction bipolar transistors

Abstract Heterojunction bipolar transistors made from GaN emitter and SiC base and collector regions are desired for high power, broad bandwidth microwave amplifiers. Their most critical element is the quality of the base-emitter junction. High efficiency emitter injection requires an interface between these lattice-mismatched materials, which does not produce significant leakage current due to defects, in addition to having desirable band-offsets. An important factor in understanding GaN/SiC heterojunction rectification is accounting for spontaneous polarization and piezoelectric effects. Theory is presented which shows that a strained GaN/SiC junction will form a 2D hole gas in the base, while an unstrained junction will form a 2D-electron gas. Extending the critical thickness of GaN grown on SiC using patterned area growth might permit improved interface properties.

Resonant magnetopolaron effects in GaAs/AlGaAs multiple quantum well structures

A detailed experimental study of electron cyclotron resonance (CR) has been carried out at 4.2 K in three modulation-doped GaAs/Al0.3Ga0.7As multiple quantum well samples in fields up to 30 T. A strong avoided-level-crossing splitting of the CR energies due to resonant magnetopolaron effects is observed for all samples near the GaAs reststrahlen region. Resonant splittings in the region of AlAs-like interface phonon modes of the barriers are observed in two samples with narrower well width and smaller doping concentration. The interaction between electrons and the AlAs interface optical phonon modes has been calculated for our specific sample structures in the framework of the memory-function formalism. The calculated results are in good agreement with the experimental results, which confirms our assignment of the observed splitting near the AlAs-like phonon region is due to the resonant magnetopolaron interaction of electrons in the wells with AlAs-like interface phonons

High-field cyclotron resonance and electron-phonon interaction in modulation-doped multiple quantum well structures

A systematic study of electron cyclotron resonance (CR) in two sets of GaAs/Al0.3Ga0.7As modulation-doped quantum-well samples (well widths between 12 and 24 nm) has been carried out in magnetic fields up to 30 T. Polaron CR is the dominant transition in the region of GaAs optical phonons for the set of lightly doped samples, and the results are in good agreement with calculations that include the interaction with interface optical phonons. The results from the heavily doped set are markedly different. At low magnetic fields (below the GaAs reststrahlen region), all three samples exhibit almost identical CR which shows little effect of the polaron interaction due to screening and Pauli-principle effects. Above the GaAs LO-phonon region (B > similar to 23 T), the three samples behave very differently. For the most lightly doped sample (3 x 10(11) cm(-2)) only one transition minimum is observed, which can be explained as screened polaron CR. A sample of intermediate density (6 x 10(11) cm(-2)) shows two lines above 23 T; the higher frequency branch is indistinguishable from the positions of the single line of the low density sample. For the most heavily, doped sample (1.2 x 10(12) cm(-2)) there is no evidence of high frequency resonance, and the strong, single line observed is indistinguishable from the lower branch observed from sample with intermediate doping density. We suggest that the low frequency branch in our experiment is a magnetoplasmon resonance red-shifted by disorder, and the upper branch is single-particle-like screened polaron CR