DOE PAGES title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Interwell carrier transport in InGaN/(In)GaN multiple quantum wells

Abstract

Uniform carrier distribution between quantum wells (QWs) of multiple QW light emitting diodes (LEDs) and laser diodes is important for the efficiency of device operation. In lasers, the uniform distribution ensures that all the QWs contribute to lasing; in LEDs, it enables high power operation with minimal Auger losses and a maximal efficiency. The carrier distribution between the QWs takes place via interwell (IW) transport. In polar GaN-based structures, the transport might be hindered by the strong carrier confinement and the internal electric fields. In this work, we study the IW transport in InGaN/(In)GaN multiple QW structures typical for ultraviolet-emitting devices with different well and barrier parameters. Experiments have been performed by means of time-resolved photoluminescence. We find that the IW transport rate is limited by the hole thermionic emission, which for InGaN/GaN QWs produces long transport times, ~1 ns per well, and a nonuniform IW carrier distribution. However, adding 5% In to the barriers completely changes the situation with the transport time decreasing by a factor of four and the hole thermionic emission energy from 200 meV to 70 meV. Finally, this study shows that using InGaN barriers is a promising pathway toward efficient high power InGaN LEDs.

Authors:
ORCiD logo [1]; ORCiD logo [1];  [2];  [3];  [2]; ORCiD logo [2];  [2]
  1. KTH Royal Inst. of Technology, Kista (Sweden)
  2. Univ. of California, Santa Barbara, CA (United States)
  3. National Taiwan Univ., Taipei (Taiwan)
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Univ. of California, Santa Barbara, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE); Swedish Energy Agency
OSTI Identifier:
1614094
Alternate Identifier(s):
OSTI ID: 1507224
Grant/Contract Number:  
EE0008204; 45390-1
Resource Type:
Accepted Manuscript
Journal Name:
Applied Physics Letters
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Volume: 114; Journal Issue: 15; Journal ID: ISSN 0003-6951
Publisher:
American Institute of Physics (AIP)
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSICS; 75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND SUPERFLUIDITY; Physics; Semiconductors; Thermionic emission; Time-resolved photoluminescence; Quantum wells; Lasers; Transport properties; Photoexcitations; Activation energies; Light emitting diodes; Nitrides

Citation Formats

Marcinkevičius, Saulius, Yapparov, Rinat, Kuritzky, Leah Y., Wu, Yuh-Renn, Nakamura, Shuji, DenBaars, Steven P., and Speck, James S. Interwell carrier transport in InGaN/(In)GaN multiple quantum wells. United States: N. p., 2019. Web. doi:10.1063/1.5092585.
Marcinkevičius, Saulius, Yapparov, Rinat, Kuritzky, Leah Y., Wu, Yuh-Renn, Nakamura, Shuji, DenBaars, Steven P., & Speck, James S. Interwell carrier transport in InGaN/(In)GaN multiple quantum wells. United States. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5092585
Marcinkevičius, Saulius, Yapparov, Rinat, Kuritzky, Leah Y., Wu, Yuh-Renn, Nakamura, Shuji, DenBaars, Steven P., and Speck, James S. Tue . "Interwell carrier transport in InGaN/(In)GaN multiple quantum wells". United States. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5092585. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1614094.
@article{osti_1614094,
title = {Interwell carrier transport in InGaN/(In)GaN multiple quantum wells},
author = {Marcinkevičius, Saulius and Yapparov, Rinat and Kuritzky, Leah Y. and Wu, Yuh-Renn and Nakamura, Shuji and DenBaars, Steven P. and Speck, James S.},
abstractNote = {Uniform carrier distribution between quantum wells (QWs) of multiple QW light emitting diodes (LEDs) and laser diodes is important for the efficiency of device operation. In lasers, the uniform distribution ensures that all the QWs contribute to lasing; in LEDs, it enables high power operation with minimal Auger losses and a maximal efficiency. The carrier distribution between the QWs takes place via interwell (IW) transport. In polar GaN-based structures, the transport might be hindered by the strong carrier confinement and the internal electric fields. In this work, we study the IW transport in InGaN/(In)GaN multiple QW structures typical for ultraviolet-emitting devices with different well and barrier parameters. Experiments have been performed by means of time-resolved photoluminescence. We find that the IW transport rate is limited by the hole thermionic emission, which for InGaN/GaN QWs produces long transport times, ~1 ns per well, and a nonuniform IW carrier distribution. However, adding 5% In to the barriers completely changes the situation with the transport time decreasing by a factor of four and the hole thermionic emission energy from 200 meV to 70 meV. Finally, this study shows that using InGaN barriers is a promising pathway toward efficient high power InGaN LEDs.},
doi = {10.1063/1.5092585},
journal = {Applied Physics Letters},
number = 15,
volume = 114,
place = {United States},
year = {Tue Apr 16 00:00:00 EDT 2019},
month = {Tue Apr 16 00:00:00 EDT 2019}
}

Journal Article:
Free Publicly Available Full Text
Publisher's Version of Record

Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 15 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

Save / Share:

Works referenced in this record:

Electron transport in unipolar InGaN/GaN multiple quantum well structures grown by NH 3 molecular beam epitaxy
journal, May 2015

  • Browne, David A.; Mazumder, Baishakhi; Wu, Yuh-Renn
  • Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 117, Issue 18
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.4919750

Breakdown of thermionic emission theory for quantum wells
journal, July 1994

  • Tsai, Chin‐Yi; Eastman, Lester F.; Lo, Yu‐Hwa
  • Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 65, Issue 4
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.112339

Photoexcited carrier recombination in wide m -plane InGaN/GaN quantum wells
journal, September 2013

  • Marcinkevičius, S.; Kelchner, K. M.; Kuritzky, L. Y.
  • Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 103, Issue 11
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.4820839

Temperature-dependent recombination coefficients in InGaN light-emitting diodes: Hole localization, Auger processes, and the green gap
journal, October 2016

  • Nippert, Felix; Karpov, Sergey Yu.; Callsen, Gordon
  • Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 109, Issue 16
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.4965298

Photoluminescence of two-dimensional excitons in an electric field: Lifetime enhancement and field ionization in GaAs quantum wells
journal, September 1988


Thermionic emission and Gaussian transport of holes in a GaAs/ Al x Ga 1 x As multiple-quantum-well structure
journal, September 1988


Radiative and nonradiative recombination mechanisms in nonpolar and semipolar GaInN/GaN quantum wells: Recombination in non- and semipolar GaInN/GaN quantum wells
journal, August 2015

  • Langer, Torsten; Klisch, Manuela; Alexej Ketzer, Fedor
  • physica status solidi (b), Vol. 253, Issue 1
  • DOI: 10.1002/pssb.201552353

The influence of random indium alloy fluctuations in indium gallium nitride quantum wells on the device behavior
journal, September 2014

  • Yang, Tsung-Jui; Shivaraman, Ravi; Speck, James S.
  • Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 116, Issue 11
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.4896103

Unequal Pumping of Quantum Wells in GaN-Based Laser Diodes
journal, April 2012

  • Scheibenzuber, Wolfgang G.; Schwarz, Ulrich T.
  • Applied Physics Express, Vol. 5, Issue 4
  • DOI: 10.1143/APEX.5.042103

Bloch transport of electrons and holes in superlattice minibands: Direct measurement by subpicosecond luminescence spectroscopy
journal, June 1987


Carrier Transport in InGaN MQWs of Aquamarine- and Green-Laser Diodes
journal, September 2011

  • Sizov, D. S.; Bhat, R.; Zakharian, A.
  • IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Quantum Electronics, Vol. 17, Issue 5
  • DOI: 10.1109/JSTQE.2011.2116770

Advantages of blue InGaN light-emitting diodes with InGaN-AlGaN-InGaN barriers
journal, January 2012

  • Kuo, Yen-Kuang; Wang, Tsun-Hsin; Chang, Jih-Yuan
  • Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 100, Issue 3
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.3678341

Pivotal role of ballistic and quasi-ballistic electrons on LED efficiency
journal, August 2010


The investigation on carrier distribution in InGaN/GaN multiple quantum well layers
journal, May 2011

  • Zhu, J. H.; Zhang, S. M.; Wang, H.
  • Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 109, Issue 9
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.3587176

Carrier lifetimes in AlGaN quantum wells: electric field and excitonic effects
journal, July 2008


Carrier dynamics in nitride-based light-emitting p-n junction diodes with two active regions emitting at different wavelengths
journal, August 2003

  • Li, Y. -L.; Gessmann, Th.; Schubert, E. F.
  • Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 94, Issue 4
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.1591051

Simultaneous measurements of electron and hole sweep-out from quantum wells and modeling of photoinduced field screening dynamics
journal, January 1992

  • Cavailles, J. A.; Miller, D. A. B.; Cunningham, J. E.
  • IEEE Journal of Quantum Electronics, Vol. 28, Issue 10
  • DOI: 10.1109/3.159555

Band bowing and band alignment in InGaN alloys
journal, January 2010

  • Moses, Poul Georg; Van de Walle, Chris G.
  • Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 96, Issue 2
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.3291055

Photoexcited carrier trapping and recombination at Fe centers in GaN
journal, June 2016

  • Uždavinys, T. K.; Marcinkevičius, S.; Leach, J. H.
  • Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 119, Issue 21
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.4953219

Carrier dynamics in bulk GaN
journal, January 2012

  • Šcˇajev, Patrik; Jarašiūnas, Kęstutis; Okur, Serdal
  • Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 111, Issue 2
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.3673851

Intervalley energy of GaN conduction band measured by femtosecond pump-probe spectroscopy
journal, December 2016

  • Marcinkevičius, Saulius; Uždavinys, Tomas K.; Foronda, Humberto M.
  • Physical Review B, Vol. 94, Issue 23
  • DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevB.94.235205

Optically detected carrier transport in III/V semiconductor QW structures: experiments, model calculations and applications in fast 1.55 μm laser devices
journal, January 1998

  • Hillmer, H.; Marcinkevičius, S.
  • Applied Physics B: Lasers and Optics, Vol. 66, Issue 1
  • DOI: 10.1007/s003400050350

Carrier distribution in InGaN/GaN tricolor multiple quantum well light emitting diodes
journal, October 2009

  • Charash, R.; Maaskant, P. P.; Lewis, L.
  • Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 95, Issue 15
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.3244203

Carrier distribution in (0001)InGaN∕GaN multiple quantum well light-emitting diodes
journal, February 2008

  • David, Aurélien; Grundmann, Michael J.; Kaeding, John F.
  • Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 92, Issue 5
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.2839305

Dynamics of carrier tunneling and recombination in asymmetric coupled InGaN multiple quantum wells
journal, January 2017

  • Weng, Guoen; Chen, Shaoqiang; Zhang, Baoping
  • Optics Express, Vol. 25, Issue 20
  • DOI: 10.1364/OE.25.024745

Ultrafast optical characterization of carrier capture times in InxGa1−xN multiple quantum wells
journal, July 2000

  • Özgür, Ü.; Bergmann, M. J.; Casey, H. C.
  • Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 77, Issue 1
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.126893

Interwell carrier transport in InGaAsP multiple quantum well laser structures
journal, December 1996

  • Fröjdh, K.; Marcinkevičius, S.; Olin, U.
  • Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 69, Issue 24
  • DOI: 10.1063/1.117192

Works referencing / citing this record:

Spectral-temporal dynamics of (Al,In)GaN laser diodes
journal, January 2020

  • Uhlig, Lukas; Wachs, Matthias; Kunzmann, Dominic J.
  • Optics Express, Vol. 28, Issue 2
  • DOI: 10.1364/oe.382257

III-Nitride Multi-Quantum-Well Light Emitting Structures with Selective Carrier Injection
journal, September 2019

  • El-Ghoroury, Hussein S.; Kisin, Mikhail V.; Chuang, Chih-Li
  • Applied Sciences, Vol. 9, Issue 18
  • DOI: 10.3390/app9183872