Extremely low-energy ARPES of quantum well states in cubic-GaN/AlN and GaAs/AlGaAs heterostructures

Quantum well (QW) heterostructures have been extensively used for the realization of a wide range of optical and electronic devices. Exploiting their potential for further improvement and development requires a fundamental understanding of their electronic structure. So far, the most commonly used experimental techniques for this purpose have been all-optical spectroscopy methods that, however, are generally averaging in momentum space. Additional information can be gained by angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy (ARPES), which measures the electronic structure with momentum resolution. Here we report on the use of extremely low-energy ARPES (photon energy ~ 7 eV) to increase depth sensitivity and access buried QW states, located at 3 nm and 6 nm below the surface of cubic-GaN/AlN and GaAs/AlGaAs heterostructures, respectively. We find that the QW states in cubic-GaN/AlN can indeed be observed, but not their energy dispersion, because of the high surface roughness. The GaAs/AlGaAs QW states, on the other hand, are buried too deep to be detected by extremely low-energy ARPES. Since the sample surface is much flatter, the ARPES spectra of the GaAs/AlGaAs show distinct features in momentum space, which can be reconducted to the band structure of the topmost surface layer of the QW structure. Our results provide important information about the samples’ properties required to perform extremely low-energy ARPES experiments on electronic states buried in semiconductor heterostructures.

Study of the heavily p-type doping of cubic GaN with Mg

We have studied the Mg doping of cubic GaN grown by plasma-assisted Molecular Beam Epitaxy (PA-MBE) over GaAs (001) substrates. In particular, we concentrated on conditions to obtain heavy p-type doping to achieve low resistance films which can be used in bipolar devices. We simulated the Mg-doped GaN transport properties by density functional theory (DFT) to compare with the experimental data. Mg-doped GaN cubic epitaxial layers grown under optimized conditions show a free hole carrier concentration with a maximum value of 6 × 1019 cm−3 and mobility of 3 cm2/Vs. Deep level transient spectroscopy shows the presence of a trap with an activation energy of 114 meV presumably associated with nitrogen vacancies, which could be the cause for the observed self-compensation behavior in heavily Mg-doped GaN involving Mg-VN complexes. Furthermore, valence band analysis by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and photoluminescence spectroscopy revealed an Mg ionization energy of about 100 meV, which agrees quite well with the value of 99.6 meV obtained by DFT. Our results show that the cubic phase is a suitable alternative to generate a high free hole carrier concentration for GaN.