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An evident issue in performing GaN growth along the c-direction is the generation of V-shaped pits on its surface. Here, we investigated the transition of the angle of facets forming a V-shaped pit via three-photon excitation photoluminescence (3PPL). The intermittent doping of Ge was introduced to GaN growth to observe the growth front. The size of the V-shaped pit composed of {} facets decreased along the growth direction, whereas that composed of {} facets, increased. Furthermore, planar growths of c-GaN and semipolar GaN having various surface orientations revealed that the V-shaped pit composed of {} was likely to annihilate rather than that of {} under the growth condition of N2 carrier gas, which coincides with the result of 3PPL. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fundamental electronic and optical properties of a low-resistivity m-plane GaN single crystal, which was grown by hydride vapor phase epitaxy on a bulk GaN seed crystal synthesized by the ammonothermal method in supercritical ammonia using an acidic mineralizer, were investigated. The threading dislocation and basal-plane staking-fault densities of the crystal were around 104 cm−2 and less than 100 cm−1, respectively. Oxygen doping achieved a high electron concentration of 4 × 1018 cm−3 at room temperature. Accordingly, a photoluminescence (PL) band originating from the recombination of hot carriers was observed at low temperatures, even under weak excitation conditions. The simultaneous realization of low-level incorporation of Ga vacancies (VGa) less than 1016 cm−3 was confirmed by using the positron annihilation technique. Consistent with our long-standing claim that VGa complexes are the major nonradiative recombination centers in GaN, the fast-component PL lifetime of the near-band-edge emission at room temperature longer than 2 ns was achieved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dispersion relationships of the refractive index and extinction coefficient of m-plane Al1−xInxN epitaxial films (x = 0.00, 0.23, and 0.30) grown on a freestanding m-plane GaN substrate were determined by spectroscopic ellipsometry measurement. The experimentally obtained ellipsometric parameters tan Ψ and cos Δ, which represent the differences in the p- and s-polarized amplitudes and phases of the incident light, respectively, were well fitted using the standard analytical functions. As the measurement was carried out at photon energies between 1.55 and 5.40 eV, the dispersion curves of the extinction coefficient k exhibited local maxima at approximately the Al1−xInxN bandgap energies of x = 0.23 and 0.30, and the sample with x = 0.00 showed an ordinal absorption spectrum with a bandtail formed owing to high-concentration residual impurities. A large and x-dependent energy difference between the absorption and emission spectra (Stokes’ shift) was observed for the Al1−xInxN films, suggesting the presence of carrier localization phenomena. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we discusse the origin of basal-plane stacking faults (BSFs) generated in the homoepitaxial hydride vapor phase epitaxy (HVPE) growth of m-plane gallium nitride (GaN). We investigated the effects of seed quality, especially dislocation density, on BSF generation during homoepitaxy. The results clearly identify basal-plane dislocation in the seed as a cause of BSF generation. We realized high-quality m-plane GaN substrates with a 2-in. diameter using HVPE on low-dislocation-density m-plane seeds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Local excitation and emission dynamics of an isolated “Type-I1” basal-plane stacking-fault (BSF) in very low dislocation density GaN were studied using spatio-time-resolved cathodoluminescence. The low temperature lifetime of the BSF emission was quantified to be 640 ps. The carrier diffusion length was estimated by observing the temporal delay of the BSF peak relative to the free-exciton signal as a function of distance from the BSF. The results indicate that the near-band-edge emission leads to subsequent optical excitation of the BSF that increases the apparent diffusion length. Limiting the observation volume can improve the spatial resolution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]