We fabricate and study direct InP/Si heterojunction by corrugated epitaxial lateral overgrowth (CELOG). The crystalline quality and depth-dependent charge carrier dynamics of InP/Si heterojunction are assessed by characterizing the cross-section of grown layer by low-temperature cathodoluminescence, time-resolved photoluminescence and transmission electron microscopy. Compared to the defective seed InP layer on Si, higher intensity band edge emission in cathodoluminescence spectra and enhanced carrier lifetime of InP are observed above the CELOG InP/Si interface despite large lattice mismatch, which are attributed to the reduced threading dislocation density realized by the CELOG method. (C) 2019 Optical Society of America under the terms of the OSA Open Access Publishing Agreement

A multimode scanning near-field optical microscopy technique that allows the mapping of surface morphology, photoluminescence (PL) spectra in illumination and illumination-collection modes, and PL dynamics, all in one scan, has been developed along with a method to use it for evaluation of carrier diffusion. The method allows measuring diffusion lengths as small as similar to 100 nm and their anisotropy and spatial distribution, parameters remaining inaccessible to conventional far-field techniques. The procedure has been applied to study ambipolar carrier diffusion in a nonpolar m-plane InGaN/GaN quantum well. The diffusion was found to be highly anisotropic with diffusion coefficients along and perpendicular to the wurtzite c axis equal to 0.4 and 1.9 cm(2)/s, respectively. The large diffusion anisotropy confirms band structure calculations that suggest that the topmost valence band in an m-plane InGaN quantum well is highly anisotropic.

Scanning near-field optical microscopy was used to study the influence of the surface morphology on the properties of light emission and alloy composition in InGaN epitaxial layers grown on GaN substrates. A strong correlation between the maps of the photoluminescence (PL) peak energy and the gradient of the surface morphology was observed. This correlation demonstrates that the In incorporation strongly depends on the geometry of the monolayer step edges that form during growth in the step-flow mode. The spatial distribution of nonradiative recombination centers-evaluated from PL intensity maps-was found to strongly anticorrelate with the local content of In atoms in the InGaN alloy. 

The paper reviews our recent achievements in developing a multimode scanning near-field optical microscopy (SNOM) technique. The multimode SNOM apparatus allows us to simultaneously measure spatial variations of photoluminescence spectra in the illumination and illumination-collection modes, their transients and sample surface morphology. The potential of this technique has been demonstrated on a polar InGaN epitaxial layer and nonpolar InGaN/GaN quantum wells. SNOM measurements have allowed revealing a number of phenomena, such as the band potential fluctuations and their correlation to the surface morphology, spatial nonuniformity of the radiative and nonradiative lifetimes, as well as the extended band nature of localized states. The combination of different modes enabled measurements of the ambipolar carrier diffusion and its anisotropy.

To assess the impact of random alloying on the optical properties of the InGaN alloy, high-quality InxGa1-xN (0 < x < 0.18) epilayers grown on c-plane free-standing GaN substrates are characterized both structurally and optically. The thickness (25-100 nm) was adjusted to keep these layers pseudomorphically strained over the whole range of explored indium content as checked by x-ray diffraction measurements. The evolution of the low temperature optical absorption (OA) edge line-width as a function of absorption energy, and hence the indium content, is analyzed in the framework of the random alloy model. The latter shows that the OA edge linewidth should not markedly increase above an indium content of 4%, varying from 17 meV to 30 meV for 20% indium. The experimental data initially follow the same trend with, however, a deviation from this model for indium contents exceeding only similar to 2%. Complementary room temperature near-field photoluminescence measurements carried out using a scanning near-field optical microscope combined with simultaneous surface morphology mappings reveal spatial disorder due to growth meandering. We conclude that for thick high-quality pseudomorphic InGaN layers, a deviation from pure random alloying occurs due to the interplay between indium incorporation and longer range fluctuations induced by the InGaN step-meandering growth mode.

A multimode scanning near-field optical microscopy technique allowing to map surface morphology, photoluminescence (PL) spectra in illumination and illumination-collection modes, as well as PL dynamics, all in one scan, has been developed along with a method to use it for evaluation of carrier diffusion. The method allows to measure diffusion lengths as small as ~100 nm, their anisotropy and spatial distribution, parameters remaining inaccessible to conventional far-field techniques. The procedure has been applied to study ambipolar carrier diffusion in a nonpolar m-plane InGaN/GaN quantum well. The diffusion was found to be highly anisotropic with diffusion coefficients along and perpendicular to the wurtzite c axis equal to 0.4 and 1.9 cm²/s, respectively. The large diffusion anisotropy confirms band structure calculations that suggest that the top-most valence band in m-plane InGaN quantum well is highly anisotropic

Scanning near-field photoluminescence spectroscopy has been applied to distinguish the relevance of quantum well (QW) alloy composition and well width fluctuations on emission linewidth and recombination times in semipolar (2021) plane InGaN QWs. It has been found that well width fluctuations, compared to variations of InGaN alloy composition, play a negligible role in defining the photoluminescence linewidth. However, the well width strongly affects the recombination times. Prolonged radiative and nonradiative carrier lifetimes in wide QWs have been attributed to electron and hole separation by in-plane electric fields caused by nonplanarity of QW interfaces.

Time-resolved scanning near-field photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy was applied to map carrier lifetimes in wide m-plane InGaN/GaN quantum wells grown on on-axis and miscut substrates. Both radiative and nonradiative lifetimes were found to be spatially nonuniform. Lifetime variations were smaller for quantum wells grown on miscut, as compared to on-axis substrates. Correlation with surface topography showed that largest deviations of recombination times occur at +c planes of pyramidal hillocks of the on-axis sample. Observed correlation between radiative lifetimes and PL peak wavelength was assigned to a partial electron localization.

Time-resolved transmission and reflection measurements were performed for bulk GaN at room temperature to evaluate the energy of the first conduction band satellite valley. The measurements showed clear threshold-like spectra for transmission decay and reflection rise times. The thresholds were associated with the onset of the intervalley electron scattering. Transmission measurements with pump and probe pulses in the near infrared produced an intervalley energy of 0.97±0.02 eV. Ultraviolet pump and infrared probe reflection provided a similar value. Comparison of the threshold energies obtained in these experiments allowed estimating the hole effective mass in the upper valence band to be 1.4m0. Modeling of the reflection transients with rate equations has allowed estimating electron-LO (longitudinal optical) phonon scattering rates and the satellite valley effective mass.

Fe doped GaN was studied by time-resolved photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy. The shape of PL transients at different temperatures and excitation powers allowed discrimination between electron and hole capture to Fe3+ and Fe2+ centers, respectively. Analysis of the internal structure of Fe ions and intra-ion relaxation rates suggests that for high repetition rates of photoexciting laser pulses the electron and hole trapping takes place in the excited state rather than the ground state of Fe ions. Hence, the estimated electron and hole capture coefficients of 5.5 x 10(-8) cm(3)/s and 1.8 x 10(-8) cm(3)/s should be attributed to excited Fe3+ and Fe2+ states. The difference in electron capture rates determined for high (MHz) and low (Hz) (Fang et al., Appl. Phys. Lett. 107, 051901 (2015)) pulse repetition rates may be assigned to the different Fe states participating in the carrier capture. A weak temperature dependence of the electron trapping rate shows that the potential barrier for the multiphonon electron capture is small. A spectral feature observed at similar to 420 nm is assigned to the radiative recombination of an electron in the ground Fe2+ state and a bound hole.