Mechanisms of nitrogen incorporation in GaAsN alloys

Abstract

We have investigated nitrogen incorporation mechanisms in dilute nitride GaAsN alloys grown by plasma-assisted molecular-beam epitaxy. A comparison of nuclear reaction analysis and Rutherford backscattering spectrometry in channeling and nonchanneling conditions reveals significant composition-dependent incorporation of N into nonsubstitutional sites, presumably as either N -N or N -As split interstitials. Furthermore, we identify the ͑2 ϫ 1͒ reconstruction as the surface structure which leads to the highest substitutional N incorporation, likely due to the high number of group V sites per unit area available for N -As surface exchange.

Reactively sputtered GaAsxN1−x thin films

“…The difference in the structures of GaAs and GaN and the large difference in the sizes of arsenic and nitrogen do not allow the formation of complete range of solid solution in this alloy. The smaller size of N allows its solubility in GaAs and extensive research has been reported on such alloys [3][4][5][6][7][8]. In comparison, owing to the larger size of As and consequent difficulty in the incorporation of As in GaN, very limited work has been reported on N-rich side of GaAs x N 1−x alloys, which have been mostly prepared by MOCVD and MBE [9,10].…”

High-Resolution Electron Microscopy of Semiconductor Heterostructures and Nanostructures

“…Thus, the existence of N-N split interstitials, N-As split interstitials, or (AsGa-NAs) nn pairs in Ga(AsN) has been suggested theoretically [79] and verified experimentally [80,81]. Also, the low solubility of N in GaAs [82] has been reported to induce the clustering of N atoms [83] in the alloy.…”

Oxygen Incorporation in ZnTeO Alloys via Molecular Beam Epitaxy

“…12 As nitrogen is sensitive to nuclear reaction analysis (NRA), channeling NRA provided direct experimental evidence for the identification of such interstitial nitrogen. [13][14][15][16][17] Further study also revealed that the decrease of the interstitial N concentration induced by rapid thermal annealing could result in an increase in carrier concentration and mobility. 18 Compared with N-doped III-V HMAs, there is much poorer understanding of oxygen incorporation in II-VI alloys.…”

“…Substantial efforts have been made to investigate the location of nitrogen dopant in GaAsN HMAs. [12][13][14][15][16][17] In addition to substitutional placement, a considerable fraction of the nitrogen might present as N-N or N-As split interstitials. 12 As nitrogen is sensitive to nuclear reaction analysis (NRA), channeling NRA provided direct experimental evidence for the identification of such interstitial nitrogen.…”