Patent ID: 8791499

Claim:
An optical device comprising: a gallium nitride substrate structure, the gallium nitride substrate structure including a surface region; an epitaxial layer overlying the surface region; a p-n junction formed within a portion of the epitaxial layer; one or more plane or line defects spatially configured in a manner to be intersecting one or more spatial portions of the p-n junction, the one or more plane or line defects being characterized by a spatial density of less than 1×10 4 cm −2 ; and an electrostatic discharge voltage rating of at least 7 kvolts; wherein the surface region is characterized by an m-plane that is angled ranging from about 80 degrees to about 100 degrees from the polar orientation of the c plane toward an (h k l) plane wherein l is 0 and at least one of h and k is non-zero.