Patent ID: 8519438

Claim:
A III-N semiconductor device comprising: a gate; a nitride channel layer including a first channel region beneath the gate, and two channel access regions on opposite sides of the first channel region, the composition of the nitride channel layer being selected from the group consisting of nitrides of gallium, indium and aluminum, and combinations thereof; an AlXN layer adjacent the channel layer, wherein X is selected from the group consisting of gallium, indium or their combination; and an n-doped GaN layer adjacent the AlXN layer in the areas adjacent to the channel access regions, but not in the area adjacent to the first channel region; the concentration of Al in the AlXN layer, the AlXN layer thickness, and the n-doping concentration in the n-doped GaN layer being selected to induce a 2DEG charge in the channel access regions adjacent the AlXN layer without inducing any substantial 2DEG charge in the first channel region, so that the channel is not conductive in the absence of a switching voltage applied to the gate region, but can readily become conductive when a switching voltage greater than a threshold voltage is applied to the gate region.