The Reduction of Elastic Energy Density in InN Growth on (hkl)-Oriented Planes

Simple calculations performed in the context of linear elasticity theory, indicate that growth of InN on (hkl)-oriented substrates minimizes the density of elastic energy stored in the strained layers and boosts the critical thickness for coherent growth of strained layers to unexpected values. This renders possible to grow two-dimensional InN–GaN structures with InN layers thicknesses larger than one monolayer and, in addition, continuous in the growth plane. How impacting this finding can be for optoelectronic devices using indium nitride-based heterostructures is finally discussed.