Distributed Bragg reflectors (DBRs) composed of an AlN/AlGaN superlattice were grown of Si (111) substrates. The first high-reflectance IIInitride DBR on Si was achieved by growing the DBR directly on the Si substrate to enhance the overall reflectance due to the high index of refraction contrast at the Si/AlN interface. For a 9x DBR, the measured peak reflectance of 96.8% actually exceeded the theoretical value of 96.1%. The AlN/AlGaN superlattice served the added purpose of compensating the large tensile strain developed during the growth of a crack-free 500 nm GaN / 7x DBR / Si structure. This achievement opens the possibility to manufacture high-quality III-nitride optoelectronic devices without optical absorption in the opaque Si substrate.
Threading dislocations in metal-organic chemical-vapor grown GaN films were imaged nondestructively by the electron channeling contrast imaging (ECCI) technique. Comparisons between ECCI and cross-sectional transmission electron microscopy indicated that pure edge dislocations can be imaged in GaN by ECCI. Total threading dislocation densities were measured by ECCI for various GaN films on engineered 4H-SiC surfaces and ranged from 107to109cm−2. A comparison between the ultraviolet electroluminescent output measured at 380nm and the total dislocation density as measured by ECCI revealed an inverse logarithmic dependence.
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