Free electron behavior in InN : On the role of dislocations and surface electron accumulation

• The free electron behavior in InN is studied on the basis of decoupled bulk and surface accumulation electron densities in InN films measured by contactless optical Hall effect. It is shown that the variation in the bulk electron density with film thickness does not follow the models of free electrons generated by dislocation-associated nitrogen vacancies. This finding, further supported by transmission electron microscopy results, indicates the existence of a different thickness-dependent doping mechanism. Furthermore, we observe a noticeable dependence of the surface electron density on the bulk density, which can be exploited for tuning the surface charge in future InN based devices.

Keyword

dislocations

doping

electron density

Hall effect

III-V semiconductors

indium compounds

semiconductor thin films

transmission electron microscopy

vacancies (crystal)

wide band gap semiconductors

NATURAL SCIENCES

NATURVETENSKAP

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art (subject category)