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Experimental Observation of Sequential Tunneling Transport in GaN/AlGaN Coupled Quantum Wells Grown on a Free-Standing GaN Substrate

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Abstract

A GaN/AlGaN multiple-quantum-well structure based on an asymmetric triple-quantum-well repeat unit was grown by molecular beam epitaxy, and its vertical electrical transport characteristics were investigated as a function of temperature. To minimize the density of dislocations and other structural defects providing leakage current paths, homoepitaxial growth on a free-standing GaN substrate was employed. The measured vertical-transport current-voltage characteristics were found to be highly nonlinear, especially at low temperatures, consistent with sequential tunneling through the ground-state subbands of weakly coupled adjacent quantum wells. Furthermore, different turn-on voltages were measured depending on the polarity of the applied bias, in accordance with the asymmetric subband structure of the sample repeat units.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the National Science Foundation under grant ECS-0824116. We acknowledge use of facilities in the John M. Cowley Center for High Resolution Electron Microscopy at Arizona State University.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and Photonics Center, Boston University, Boston, MA, 02215, U.S.A.

    Faisal Sudradjat, Kristina Driscoll, Yitao Liao, Anirban Bhattacharyya, Christos Thomidis, Theodore D. Moustakas & Roberto Paiella

  2. Department of Physics, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, 85287, U.S.A.

    Lin Zhou & David J. Smith

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  1. Faisal Sudradjat
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  2. Kristina Driscoll
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  3. Yitao Liao
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  4. Anirban Bhattacharyya
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  5. Christos Thomidis
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  6. Lin Zhou
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  7. David J. Smith
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  8. Theodore D. Moustakas
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  9. Roberto Paiella
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Sudradjat, F., Driscoll, K., Liao, Y. et al. Experimental Observation of Sequential Tunneling Transport in GaN/AlGaN Coupled Quantum Wells Grown on a Free-Standing GaN Substrate. MRS Online Proceedings Library 1202, 920 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1557/PROC-1202-I09-20

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1557/PROC-1202-I09-20

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