GaN-BASED LASER DIODES

Abstract

We discuss optical properties of III-Nitride materials and structures. These properties are critical for the development of III-Nitride-based light-emitting diodes and laser diodes. Minority carrier diffusion length in GaN has been determined to be ~ 0.1 μm. The properties of lasing in GaN have been studied using optical pumping. The red shift of emission peak observed in stimulated emission of GaN has been modeled and attributed to many-body interactions at high excitation. The correlation of photoluminescence and optical pumping has shown that band-to-band, or shallow donor-related bandtail to valence band transition is the necessary mechanism of lasing in GaN. This work showed that the thermal instability of InGaN at growth temperature is of main concern in the fabrication of InGaN-based MQW laser diode structures. Photoluminescence has shown that the InGaN composition is very sensitive to the growth temperature. Therefore InGaN growth temperature should be strictly controlled during InGaN-based MQW growth. This work discovered that proper annealing of Si-doping of InGaN/GaN MQW structures that are properly annealed could reduce the lasing threshold and improve the slope efficiency. Over-annealing of these MQWs can lead to thermal degradation of the active layer. Si-doping in over-annealed MQW structure further degrades its quality. The degradation has been attributed to the increase of defects and/or nonuniform local potential formation. P-type doping on the top of InGaN/GaN could also lead to the formation of compensation layer which also degrades laser diode performances. Optical confinement and carrier confinement in InGaN-based laser diode structures are evaluated for optimum laser diode design. The state-of-the-art and fundamental issues of InGaN-based light-emitting diodes and laser diodes are discussed.