Effect of AlN/GaN superlattice buffer on the strain state in GaN-on-Si(111) system

Abstract

The effect of AlN/GaN superlattice (SL) buffer on the strain state in a GaN-on-Si(111) system was studied in detail by room-temperature micro-Raman scattering measurement. An abnormal satellite peak attached to a GaN E2 peak was observed, which was verified to stem from the compressively strained GaN in SLs. The results indicate that the strain-sensitive GaN E2 (high) peak in the GaN-on-Si system with AlN/GaN SLs splits into two peaks because the GaN stress state in the top GaN layer is different from that in SLs. The compressive stress in the GaN layer in SLs was introduced by the AlN layer in each SL period because of the lattice mismatch between GaN and AlN, which ultimately counterbalanced the tensile stress in the top GaN during cooling. Such a counterbalance interaction is strongly dependent on the stiffness coefficient of AlN/GaN SLs, which is proportional to the number of periods of SLs and the relative thickness of AlN in SLs. Such two E2 peaks from GaN enable us to monitor the strain state in the GaN-on-Si system with AlN/GaN SLs quantitatively.