DX CENTERS IN AlGaN

Abstract

In this letter, recent theoretical and experimental investigations of DX centers in Al x Ga 1-x N are reviewed. Due to the technological importance of III–V nitride semiconductors, studies of deep-level defects in AlGaN have attracted a great deal of interest. Oxygen impurities form DX centers in GaN under hydrostatic pressure and in Al x Ga 1-x N alloys. For GaN under pressures greater than 20 GPa, the DX level emerges from the conduction band, leading to a decrease in the free-electron concentration. The localization of free carriers leads to a decrease in the far-infrared absorption and an increase in the LO Raman peak intensity. In Al x Ga 1-x N alloys, Hall effect and persistent photoconductivity measurements indicate that the DX state is energetically favorable for x>0.3. The experimental data for oxygen DX centers are in excellent agreement with first-principles calculations. Experiments have shown that silicon remains a shallow donor up to at least x=0.5 and theory indicates that it may remain shallow up to x=1.