This study investigated the fabrication of porous fluorescent SiC using a constant voltage-controlled anodic oxidation process. The application of a high, constant voltage resulted in a spatial distinction between the porous structures formed inside the fluorescent SiC substrates, due to the different etching rates at the terrace and the large step bunches. Large, dendritic porous structures were formed as the etching process continued and the porous layer thickened. Under the conditions of low hydrofluoric acid (HF) concentration, the uniformity of the dendritic porous structures through the entire porous layer was considerably improved compared with the conditions of high HF concentration. The resulting large uniform structure offered a sizable surface area, and promoted the penetration of atomic layer-deposited (ALD) Al2O3 films (ALD–Al2O3). The emission intensity in the porous fluorescent SiC was confirmed via photoluminescence (PL) measurements to be significantly improved by a factor of 128 after ALD passivation. With surface passivation, there was a clear blueshift in the emission wavelength, owing to the effective suppression of the non-radiative recombination rate in the porous structures. Furthermore, the spatial uniformity of emitted light was examined via PL mapping using three different excitation lasers, which resulted in the observation of uniform and distinctive emissions in the fluorescent SiC bulk and porous areas.

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We investigated the effects of different growth facets of 6H-SiC and different voltage waveforms on the porous structure and luminescence properties. The structure formed on the surface after anodic etching significantly changed because of the difference in the growth plane, whereas dendritic and columnar pores were observed inside the Si- and C-face samples. These large porous structures were shown to promote the penetration depth of the atomic-layer-deposited Al2O3 films, and a recorded passivation depth of 30-µm layer was confirmed in C-face porous SiC. From the results using fluorescence microscope and PL spectra measurement, it was concluded that the pulsed-voltage etching was preferable for fabricating uniform porous structures compared with the constant-voltage etching. However, the enhancement of the luminescence intensity needs to be further improved to realize high luminescent efficiency in porous fluorescent SiC.

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