Progress toward achieving high power and high efficiency semipolar LEDs and their characterization

Performance of current commercially available wurtzite nitride based light-emitting diodes (LEDs), grown along the polar (0001) c-plane orientation, is limited by the presence of polarization-related electric fields inside multi-quantum wells (MQWs). The discontinuities in both spontaneous and piezoelectric polarization at the heterointerfaces result in internal electric fields in the quantum wells. These electric fields cause carrier separation [quantum confined Stark effect (QCSE)] and reduce the radiative recombination rate within the quantum wells. One approach to reduce and possibly eliminate the polarization-related effects is to grow III-nitride devices on crystal planes that are inclined with respect to the c-axis, i.e., on semipolar planes.;In this dissertation, metalorganic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) has been employed for the homoepitaxial growth of GaN based LEDs on semipolar orientations. As a consequence of growing on high-quality bulk GaN substrates, the LEDs have significantly reduced threading dislocation and stacking fault densities, resulting in remarkable improvements in EQE and output power. High efficiency semipolar (1011) violet-blue and blue LEDs have been demonstrated without any intentional effort to enhance the light extraction from those devices. Optimizations of epitaxial structures have led to increased output power and external quantum efficiency. A silicone encapsulated single quantum well blue LED with peak wavelength of 444 nm with output power of 24.3 mW, external quantum efficiency of 43% and luminous efficacy of 75 lm/W (with phosphorescent coating) at 20 mA has been demonstrated.;Polarization fields in strained (1011) and (112¯2) InGaN quantum wells have been experimentally determined through bias-dependent optical studies. Our results show that the polarization field flips its direction in semipolar InGaN quantum wells with large inclination angles (i.e. around 60°). This suggests that there exists a polarization 'crossover' at an inclination angle between 0 and 60° at which the polarization field vanishes and beyond which the direction of the polarization field reverses. In addition, our study provides indirect evidence of a negative piezoelectric constant e15 for the nitride material system while most of the current literatures have reported a positive e 15.