Growth of wurtzite and zinc-blende phased GaN on silicon (100) substrate with sputtered AlN buffer layer

Abstract

GaN films were grown by plasma-assisted molecular beam epitaxy with a sputtered AlN buffer layer on Si (100) substrate. From the analyses of X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and photoluminescence (PL) measurements, we showed that the variant M-plane, A-plane and c-plane GaN wurtzite structures can be achieved by the selection of crystalline orientation of sputtered AlN buffer layer and the control of epitaxial growth temperature. We also found that the GaN layer grown on sputtered AlN buffer layer can be converted to GaN zinc-blende structure at the epitaxial growth temperature higher than 750°C and under Ga-rich condition.