Surface potential effect on excitons in AIGaN/GaN quantum well structures

摘要

AIGaN/GaN quantum well (QW) heterostructures grown by metalorganic chemical vapor deposition on sapphire and on free-standing GaN substrates have been studied by temperature dependent time-resolved photoluminescence. A dominant contribution of the exciton radiative lifetime is observed in homoepitaxial samples even at enhanced temperatures up to 100 K. The QW-related emission is found to be more sensitive to the near surface built-in electric field in the homoepitaxial samples, revealed as a red shift of the QW exciton energy with decreasing the cap layer thickness. Absence of such shift in the heteroepitaxial samples suggests, assuming a surface potential of 0.5 eV, an increased polarization field due to residual compressive stress.