Optical characteristics of a-plane InGaN/GaN multiple quantum wells with different well widths

a-plane InGaN/GaN multiple quantum wells of different widths ranging from 3 to 12 nm were grown on r-plane sapphire by metal organic chemical vapor deposition for investigation. The peak emission intensity of the photoluminescence (PL) reveals a decreasing trend as the well width increases from 3 to 12 nm. Low temperature (9 K) time-resolved PL study shows that the sample with 3-nm-thick wells has a better optical property with a fast exciton decay time of 0.57 ns. The results of cathodoluminescence and micro-PL scanning images for samples of different well widths further verify the more uniform and stronger luminescence intensity distribution observed for the samples of thinner quantum wells, indicating that the important growth parameters for a-plane InGaN/GaN multiple quantum wells could be dominated by the In fluctuation and crystal quality during the epitaxial growth. (c) 2007 American Institute of Physics.