Growth stresses and cracking in GaN films on (111) Si grown by metalorganic chemical vapor deposition. II. Graded AlGaN buffer layers J. Appl. Phys. 98, 023515 (2005); 10.1063/1.1978992 Ductile relaxation in cracked metal-organic chemical-vapor-deposition-grown AlGaN films on GaN A method is presented to achieve thick high quality crack-free AlGaN layers on GaN. This method uses jointly plastic relaxation and lateral growth. In a first step, plastic relaxation by cracking and misfit dislocation introduction is realized. Then the cracks are overgrown to obtain a smooth surface. By this reproducible technique, we grew smooth metal-organic chemical vapor deposition Al 0.2 Ga 0.8 N films with a threading dislocation density as low as 5ϫ10 8 cm Ϫ2 . This result is the best ever reported for crack-free AlGaN growth over a large area. The control of the complete plastic relaxation opens up perspectives for the realization of high performance devices. In order to explain the mechanisms involved in the full relaxation of the AlGaN/GaN heterostructure, we propose a relaxation scheme and discuss its different steps.

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This work is dedicated to the study of the growth by ammonia source molecular beam epitaxy of AlxGa1−xN/GaN high electron mobility transistors on (111) oriented silicon substrates. The effect of growth conditions on the structural and electrical properties of the heterostructures was investigated. It is shown that even a slight variation in the growth temperature of the thick GaN buffer on AlN/GaN stress mitigating layers has a drastic influence on these properties via a counterintuitive effect on the dislocation density. Both in situ curvature measurements and ex situ transmission electron microscopy and x-ray diffraction experiments indicate that the relaxation rate of the lattice mismatch stress increases with the growth temperature but finally results in a higher dislocations density. Furthermore, a general trend appears between the final wafer curvature at room temperature and the threading dislocation density. Finally, the influence of the dislocation density on the GaN buffer insulating properties and the two-dimensional electron gas transport properties at the AlxGa1−xN/GaN interface is discussed.

Meltback etching, a deteriorating chemical reaction occurring between gallium and silicon under typical metal organic chemical vapor deposition growth conditions, is a common problem that often limits the development of GaN on silicon substrates, in particular, patterned substrates, and therefore must be circumvented. To further understand this reaction, energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy was performed in cross-section, and a proposed 2-dimensional model on how meltback etching evolves throughout the growth process is discussed, which indicated an inter-diffusion reaction occurring primarily between gallium and silicon where gallium from GaN diffuses into the silicon substrate while silicon from the substrate diffuses out and incorporates into the GaN crystal. Moreover, we demonstrate an anisotropic behavior of the gallium penetrating the silicon substrate, which has shown to be delimited by the Si {111} planes. Finally, an approach to prevent meltback etching by changing the fractions of nitrogen and hydrogen in the carrier gas is presented and discussed.