Mechanism of thermal degradation in GaInN/GaN quantum wells

In this contribution we focus on degradation processes of GaInN multiple quantum wells (MQWs) used in laser structures grown by metallorganic vapor pressure epitaxy (MOVPE). The influence of ramp-up time as well as the maximum temperature during growth of the barrier on the quantum well (QW) is investigated. Comparison of X-ray and photoluminescence (PL) measurements implies that a sufficient thickness of a cover layer grown at low temperature is required to prevent degradation of the QW. In a next step samples were grown using an optimal thermal budget during growth of the active region to investigate the influence of capping layers. To improve crystalline quality of these layers high temperatures are required. Our measurements show that these high temperatures lead to a decrease in average indium concentration of the QWs. This decrease is temperature as well as time dependent (∝ √t) and can only explained by diffusion processes. The activation energies are in the range 0.7-0.9 eV (© 2009 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)