Growth of High-Quality, Thick, Non-Polar M-Plane GaN Films

Brief Description

A novel method of growing highly planar, fully transparent and specular m-plane gallium nitride (GaN) films.

Background

Current nitride technology for electronic and optoelectronic devices employs nitride films grown along the polar c-direction. However, conventional c-plane quantum well structures in III-nitride based optoelectronic and electronic devices suffer from the undesirable quantum-confined Stark effect (QCSE), due to the existence of strong piezoelectric effects and spontaneous polarizations. Thus, there is a need for an efficient approach to eliminating the spontaneous and piezoelectric polarization effects in GaN optoelectronic devices.

Description

Researchers at the University of California, Santa Barbara have developed a novel method of growing highly planar, fully transparent and specular m-plane gallium nitride (GaN) films. The method provides for a significant reduction in structural defect densities via a lateral overgrowth technique. As a result of this invention, it is now possible to grow high-quality, thick non-polar m-plane GaN films that may be subsequently used as substrates for the growth of improved electronic and optoelectronic devices by a variety of growth techniques.

Advantages

• Substantial improvement in (GaN) film quality

• Reduced dislocation and stacking fault densities

Applications

• Fabrication of GaN Films

• GaN optoelectronic devices

This technology is available for a non-exclusive license.

Patent Status