Current injection 1 . 54 μ m light-emitting devices based on Er-doped GaN / AlGaN multiple quantum wells

We report on the growth, fabrication and electroluminescence (EL) characteristics of light-emitting diodes (LEDs) based on Er-doped GaN (GaN:Er) and GaN/AlGaN multiple quantum well (MQW:Er) active layers. The LED structures were grown using metal organic chemical vapor deposition and processed into 300x300 μm mesa devices. The LEDs exhibit emission at 1.54 μm, due to Er intra-4f transitions, under forward bias conditions. The 1.54 μm emission properties from LEDs with MQWs:Er and GaN:Er active layers were probed. The LEDs fabricated using MQWs:Er exhibited improved performance as evidenced by a factor of 4 enhancement in the optical power output as compared to conventional GaN:Er based LEDs. The results demonstrate a significant advance in the development of current injected, chip-scale emitters and waveguide amplifiers based on Er doped semiconductors. © 2016 Optical Society of America OCIS codes: (160.5690) Rare-earth-doped materials; (250.5590) Quantum-well devices. 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Introduction
Rare earth (RE) doped III-nitride semiconductors have attracted a lot of interest for applications in full color display systems to optical communication devices with multiple functionalities.Such functionalities are not possible to obtain from either Er-doped silica glasses or narrow bandgap semiconductors [1][2][3][4][5].Erbium (Er) has been the main RE element under investigation in these semiconductors, due to the importance of the 1.54 μm emission resulting from the intra-4f transition from the first excited manifold ( 4 I 13/2 ) to the ground state ( 4 I 15/2 ) in Er 3+ ions for telecommunications.Wide band gap semiconductors, doped with Er, exhibit spectral emissions from the visible to near infrared (IR) region due to the Er intra-4f transitions [6].The 1.54 μm emission lies in the minimum loss region of silica fibers used in optical communications.It is well established that the thermal quenching of the Er 3+ emission intensity depends strongly on the band gap of the host semiconductor and is dramatically reduced in wide band-gap semiconductors [7].Er doped III-nitride semiconductors are of great interest for applications in light-emitting diodes (LEDs) operating at 1.54 µm, because of their temperature insensitive, sharp and stable emission and an ease of current injection.The structural and thermal stability, as well as recent advancements in growth techniques of high quality III-nitride materials with both n-and p-type conductivities, provides the opportunity to create efficient light-emitting devices [6].
To improve the quantum efficiency of the GaN:Er based LEDs, the excitation efficiency of the Er ions has to be improved.Using quantum well (QW) architecture is expected to enhance both the spatial confinement and density of states of carriers within the well layers leading to an increase in the carrier density and energy transfer from carriers to Er 3+ ions.Furthermore, the use of the QW architecture allows the flexibility in strain engineering which was shown to be an effective means in optimizing the emission characteristics of Er doped semiconductors [24,25].Recently, we have demonstrated through photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy that Er doped GaN/AlN multiple QWs(MQWs:Er) structure is an effective means for dramatically enhancing the quantum efficiency of the 1.54 µm emission in Er doped GaN via quantum confinement [26].
In this letter, we report on MOCVD synthesis and fabrication of Er-doped GaN p-i-n LEDs based on AlGaN/GaN multiple quantum wells (MQWs).The electroluminescence (EL) spectra, current-voltage (I-V) characteristics, and light emission characteristics (L-I) of fabricated LEDs were measured and discussed.The characteristics of the LEDs with MQWs:Er have been studied and compared to LEDs incorporating GaN:Er epilayer as the active layer.The devices showed a dominant EL emission at 1.54 µm under forward bias.The performance of the LEDs fabricated using MQWs:Er was significantly improved, as manifested by enhanced electroluminescence (EL) intensity and integrated optical power over the near IR regions.However, the turn-on voltage for LEDs fabricated using MQWs:Er is higher than that of LEDs using GaN:Er.

Experimental details
The device structure was a p-i-n diode for which the i-layer was Er doped GaN/AlGaN multiple quantum wells (MQWs:Er).The p-i-n structures were grown on GaN/sapphire templates by MOCVD.The metalorganic sources used were trimethylaluminum, trimethylgallium, and biscyclopentadienylmagnesium, for aluminum, gallium, and magnesium, respectively.Trisisopropylcyclopentadienylerbium was used for the in situ Er doping.Blue ammonia and silane (SiH 4 ) were used as nitrogen and silicon sources, respectively.Hydrogen was the carrier gas.The growth was initiated by a thin low temperature (550 °C) GaN buffer layer grown on sapphire (0001) substrate, followed by undoped GaN template with a thickness of about 1.0 µm grown at 1050 °C.This was then followed by the growth of a 2.5 µm Si-doped GaN epilayer at 1060 °C.The targeted electron concentration was around 5x10 18 cm −3 .It was then followed by the growth of the MQWs:Er structure with 40 periods of 2 nm Er doped GaN well and 10 nm undoped Al 0.1 Ga 0.9 N barrier.The growth temperature and pressure were 1020 °C and 30 mbar, respectively.The targeted Er concentration in the QW layer was 2x10 19 cm −3 .The structure was then completed with a 0.3 µm thick p-GaN contact layer.The targeted hole concentration was around 3x10 17 cm −3 .For comparison, LEDs incorporating 80 nm thick GaN:Er layer as an active region, providing the same thickness of Er doped layer as in MQWs:Er, was also fabricated.
The LED fabrication process was identical to that of a blue/green LED and started from the deposition of Ni/Au semitransparent layer and mesa etching to expose the n-type GaN, followed by Ti/Al/Ti/Au metal deposition for the n-contact and Ni/Au for p-contact with a rapid thermal annealing at 450 °C for 30 min.LEDs with different mesa disk sizes were then diced into single devices, flip-chip bonded with Au bumps onto ceramic AlN submount, and finally mounted on TO headers.The EL, I-V, and total emitted power of the fabricated LEDs were measured using a microprobe station comprised of a source meter (Keithley 2400), and spectrometer for the IR region (Bayspec 2020 with a deep cooled InGaAs detector).The device layer structure employed in this study is schematically shown in Fig. 2(a), which utilizes MQWs:Er structure as an active layer.Electroluminescence properties of MQWs:Er and GaN:Er based LED structures were measured at room temperature.Infrared spectra shown in Fig. 3 were detected at 20 mA current injection from MQWs:Er and GaN:Er based LED structures.Both devices exhibit emission peak at 1.54 µm (~0.81 eV), corresponding to the intra-4f Er 3+ transitions from the first excited state ( 4 I 13/2 ) to the ground state ( 4 I 15/2 ).The intensity of the 1.54 µm emission peak from the device utilizing MQWs:Er is 4 times higher than that from the device utilizing GaN:Er epilayer with a comparable Er active layer thickness.This large enhancement indicates that the MQW architecture significantly enhances the excitation efficiency of Er 3+ owing to the enhanced carrier density in quantum wells [26].The light emission characteristics of the 1.54 µm LEDs were estimated by comparing the intensity change with increasing current, as shown in Fig. 4. The light output of the 1.54 µm LED with MQWs:Er active layer is 4 times higher than that of the 1.54 µm LED with GaN:Er active layer at I > 20 mA.A three times enhancement was reported for MQW:Eu structures [28].The light output is significantly enhanced when replacing GaN:Er active layer with MQWs:Er active layer.The cause for the superiority of 1.54 µm LED with MQWs:Er active layer is the enhancement of the quantum efficiency of the 1.54 µm emission via quantum confinement [26].

Figure 1 (
Figure 1(a) shows the entire temperature profile of complete growth process.Figure 1(b) shows the trace of in situ optical reflectivity with monitoring wavelength of 670 nm during the LED structure growth.GaN layers and MQW:Er growths exhibit different oscillation periods in the Fig. due to their reflectivity differences at the growth temperature.No damping

Fig. 1 .
Fig. 1.(a) The growth temperature sequence and (b) In situ optical reflection curve in the whole growth process of 1.54 µm LED structure incorporating MQWs:Er as active layer.Inset: Schematic layer structure of 1.54 µm LED.

Figure 2 (
b) shows the optical microscopy image of a fabricated device with a size of 300 x 300 µm 2 .

Fig. 2 .
Fig. 2. (a) Device layer structure employed in this study and (b) the optical microscopy image of a fabricated device of size 300 x 300 µm 2 .

Fig. 3 .
Fig. 3. EL spectra from MQW:Er and GaN:Er based LED structures in near Infrared region under a current injection of 20 mA.

Fig. 4 .
Fig. 4. Light output vs current (L-I) characteristics of 1.54 µm LEDs with MQWs:Er active layer and GaN:Er active layer under wafer probe.