(Invited) MOCVD GaN-on-GaN Towards Vertical Power Devices & MOCVD Development of β-Ga2O3
Authors: Zhao Hongping 
Published: December 2020

Gallium nitride (GaN) has been considered as a promising candidate for power device applications due to the wide band gap (3.4 eV), high critical electric field (3 MV/cm) and high electron mobility (>1000 cm2/Vs). Baliga’s figure of merit (BFOM) of GaN is more than 500 times higher than silicon (Si) and more than three time higher than silicon carbide (SiC). Due to the availability of native GaN substrates, it is feasible to develop high performance GaN vertical power devices on low-defect GaN substrate. GaN-on-GaN vertical PN diode with record high VBR ~5 KV was reported [1], presenting the potential of GaN as a high-performance material for power devices. Compared with SiC, the performance of GaN vertical PN diodes is still limited by its high background doping in n-type drift layer at mid-1015 to low-1016 cm-3 range. Therefore, it is of great importance to study the sources and incorporation mechanisms of unintentionally doped background impurities in metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) GaN growth, to control the impurity incorporation, in order to maximize device performance for GaN based vertical power devices. This talk will discuss the dependence of MOCVD growth conditions on the impurity incorporations such as C, Si, O, H, and Fe. Quantitative SIMS and CV measurements are used for material characterization.

Ultrawide bandgap (UWBG) gallium oxide (Ga2O3) with a band gap of 4.5-4.9 eV, represents an emerging semiconductor material with excellent chemical and thermal stability. The monoclinic β-phase Ga2O3 represents the thermodynamically stable crystal among the known five known phases (α, β, γ, d , ε). The breakdown field of β-Ga2O3 is estimated to be 6-8 MV/cm. These unique properties make β-Ga2O3 a promising candidate for high power electronic device and solar blind photodetector applications. Single crystal β-Ga2O3 substrates can be synthesized by scalable and low cost melting based growth techniques. MOCVD growth technique was used to develop high quality β-Ga2O3 thin films and its ternary alloy (AlxGa1-x)2O3. Control of background and n-type doping in β-Ga2O3 will be discussed. Record carrier mobilities of 194 cm2/V·s at room temperature and ~10,000 cm2/V·s at low temperature were measured for MOCVD β-Ga2O3 thin films [2]. MOCVD growth of β-AlGaO targeting for Al composition of > 40% will be discussed [3, 4].

Acknowledgement: The authors acknowledge the funding support from Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) DE-AR0001036, U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) under the Advanced Manufacturing Office, FY18/FY19 Lab Call, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research FA9550-18-1-0479 (AFOSR, Dr. Ali Sayir) and the National Science Foundation (1810041, 1755479).

[1] H. Ohta, N. Asai, F. Horikiri, Y. Narita, T. Yoshida, and T. Mishima, Jpn. J. Appl. Phys. 58, SCCD03 (2019).

[2] Z. Feng, A F M A. U. Bhuiyan, M. R. Karim, H. Zhao, Appl. Phys. Letts., 114, 250601, 2019.

[3] A F M A. U. Bhuiyan, Z. Feng, J. M. Johnson, Z. Chen, H. -L. Huang, J. Hwang, H. Zhao, Appl. Phys. Lett., 115, 120602, 2019.

[4] A F M A. U. Bhuiyan, Z. Feng, J. M. Johnson, H.-L. Huang, J. Sarker, M. Zhu, M. R. Karim, B. Mazumder, J. Hwang, and H. Zhao, APL Materials, 8, 031104, 2020.