Lattice site location and annealing behavior of implanted Ca and Sr in GaN

Abstract

We report on the lattice location of ion-implanted Ca and Sr in thin films of single-crystalline wurtzite GaN. Using the emission channeling technique the angular distributions of β− particles emitted by the radioactive isotopes 45Ca (t1/2=163.8 d) and 89Sr (t1/2=50.53 d) were monitored with a position-sensitive detector following 60 keV room-temperature implantation. Our experiments give direct evidence that ∼90% of Ca and >60% of Sr atoms were occupying substitutional Ga sites with root mean square displacements of the order of 0.15–0.30 Å, i.e., larger than the expected thermal vibration amplitude of 0.074 Å. Annealing the Ca implanted samples at 1100–1350 °C in high-pressure N2 atmosphere resulted in a better incorporation into the substitutional Ga site. The Sr implanted sample showed a small decrease in rms displacements for vacuum annealing up to 900 °C, while the substitutional fraction remained nearly constant. The annealing behavior of the rms displacements can explain why annealing temperatures above 1100 °C are needed to achieve electrical and optical activations, despite the fact that the majority of the acceptors are already located on Ga sites immediately after ion implantation.