Improved crystalline quality of N-polar GaN epitaxial layers grown with reformed flow-rate-modulation technology

A reformed flow-rate-modulation technology was developed for the metalorganic vapor phase epitaxy (MOVPE) growth of the N-polar GaN epitaxial layers. To improve the crystalline quality of the N-polar GaN epitaxial layers, a GaN nucleation layer was grown at relatively low temperature with carefully-controlled pulsed supply of Ga source and showed diverse morphology with atomic force microscope (AFM). Furthermore, the electrical and optical properties of the grown N-polar GaN epitaxial layers were investigated extensively by means of Hall effect, photoluminescence (PL), and X-ray rocking curve (XRC) measurements. The characterization results revealed that as compared with the N-polar GaN epitaxial layer grown over the conventional GaN nucleation layer which was deposited with continuous supply of both N and Ga sources, the electrical and optical properties of the N-polar GaN epitaxial layer grown with optimized supply of Ga source for the GaN nucleation layer were significantly improved. (C) 2017 The Japan Society of Applied Physics