The microstructure of non-polar a-plane (11(2)over-bar0) InGaN quantum wells

JT Griffiths and F Oehler and FZ Tang and SY Zhang and WY Fu and TT Zhu and SD Findlay and CL Zheng and J Etheridge and TL Martin and PAJ Bagot and MP Moody and D Sutherland and P Dawson and MJ Kappers and CJ Humphreys and RA Oliver, JOURNAL OF APPLIED PHYSICS, 119, 175703 (2016).

DOI: 10.1063/1.4948299

Atom probe tomography and quantitative scanning transmission electron microscopy are used to assess the composition of non-polar a-plane (11-20) InGaN quantum wells for applications in opto-electronics. The average quantum well composition measured by atom probe tomography and quantitative scanning transmission electron microscopy quantitatively agrees with measurements by X-ray diffraction. Atom probe tomography is further applied to study the distribution of indium atoms in non-polar a-plane (11-20) InGaN quantum wells. An inhomogeneous indium distribution is observed by frequency distribution analysis of the atom probe tomography measurements. The optical properties of non-polar (11-20) InGaN quantum wells with indium compositions varying from 7.9% to 20.6% are studied. In contrast to non-polar m-plane (1-100) InGaN quantum wells, the non-polar a-plane (11-20) InGaN quantum wells emit at longer emission wavelengths at the equivalent indium composition. The non-polar a-plane (11-20) quantum wells also show broader spectral linewidths. The longer emission wavelengths and broader spectral linewidths may be related to the observed inhomogeneous indium distribution. (C) 2016 Author(s). All article content, except where otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

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