Improved hot-wall MOCVD growth of highly uniform AlGaN/GaN/HEMT structures

The inherent advantages of the hot-wall metal organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) reactor (low temperature gradients, less bowing of the wafer during growth, efficient precursor cracking) compared to a cold-wall reactor make it easier to obtain uniform growth. However, arcing may occur in the growth chamber during growth, which deteriorates the properties of the grown material. By inserting insulating pyrolytic BN (PBN) stripes in the growth chamber we have completely eliminated this problem. Using this novel approach we have grown highly uniform, advanced high electron mobility transistor (HEMT) structures on 4 '' semi-insulating (SI) SiC substrates with gas-foil rotation of the substrate. The nonuniformities of sheet resistance and epilayer thickness are typically less than 3% over the wafer. The room temperature hall mobility of the 2DEG is well above 2000 cm(2)/V s and the sheet resistance about 270 Omega/sqr. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.