This paper reports that Al1-xInxN epilayers were grown on GaN template by metalorganic chemical vapor deposition with an In content of 7%--20%. X-ray diffraction results indicate that all these Al1-xInxN epilayers have a relatively low density of threading dislocations. Rutherford backscattering/channeling measurements provide the exact compositional information and show that a gradual variation in composition of the Al1-xInxN epilayer happens along the growth direction. The experimental results of optical reflection clearly show the bandgap energies of Al1-xInxN epilayers. A bowing parameter of 6.5~eV is obtained from the compositional dependence of the energy gap. The cathodoluminescence peak energy of the Al1-xInxN epilayer is much lower than its bandgap, indicating a relatively large Stokes shift in the Al1-xInxN sample.
A violet laser diode （LD） structure is grown on a free-standing c-plane GaN substrate and 4 μm×800μm ridge waveguide LDs are fabricated. The electrical and the optical characteristics of LDs under different facet-coating and chip-mounting conditions are investigated under pulse mode operation. The active region temperatures of p-side up and p-side down mounted LDs are calculated with different injection currents. The calculated thermal resistances of p-side up and p-side down mounted LDs are 4.6 K/W and 3 K/W, respectively. The threshold current of the p-side down mounted LD is much lower than that of the p-side up mounted LD. The blue shift of the emission wavelength with increasing injection current is observed only for the LD with p-side down mounting configuration, due to the more efficient heat dissipation.
In situ optical reflectivity measurements are employed to monitor the GaN epilayer growth process above a lowtemperature GaN buffer layer on a c-plane sapphire substrate by metalorganic chemical vapour deposition. It is found that the lateral growth of the GaN islands and their coalescence are promoted in the initial growth stage if optimized nitridation time and temperature are selected when the substrate is pre-exposed to ammonia. As confirmed by atomic force microscopy observations, the quality of the CaN epilayers is closely dependent on the surface morphology of the nitridated buffer layer, especially grain size and nucleation density.
We have investigated the distribution of the electric field in p-i-n GaN avalanche photodiodes under different reverse bias values. type and separate absorption and multiplication （SAM） type We have also analyzed the influences of the parameters of each layer, including width and concentration, on the distribution of the electric field, especially on the breakdown voltage. It is found that a relatively high concentration of p-GaN （higher than 1×10^18 cm-3） and low cartier concentration of i-GaN （lower than 5×1016 cm-3） are helpful to restrict the electric field and reduce the breakdown voltage. In a SAM （p-i-n-i-n） structure, a suitable choice should be made for the concentration and thickness of the intermediate n-GaN layer in order to decrease breakdown voltage and prevent the device from degenerating into a p-i-n structure. Finally, the optimized material parameters of each layer are proposed.
The composition and stain distributions in the InGaN epitaxial films are jointly measured by employing various x-ray diffraction （XRD） techniques, including out-of-plane XRD at special planes, in-plane grazing incidence XRD, and reciprocal space mapping （RSM）. It is confirmed that the measurement of （204） reflection allows a rapid access to estimate the composition without considering the influence of biaxial strain. The two-dimensional RSM checks composition and degree of strain relaxation jointly, revealing an inhomogeneous strain distribution profile along the growth direction. As the film thickness increases from 100 nm to 450 nm, the strain status of InGaN films gradually transfers from almost fully strained to fully relaxed state and then more In atoms incorporate into the film, while the near-interface region of InGaN films remains pseudomorphic to GaN.
