X-ray standing wave investigations of Si dopant incorporation in GaN

Abstract

The synchrotron radiation technique of x-ray standing waves (XSW), which allows to directly obtain structural and element-specific data, was successfully used for the investigation of the dopant site distribution in Si doped GaN films grown on (0001) sapphire substrates for the first time. The Si dopant concentration was chosen to 5×10¹⁸ cm⁻³ and 5×10¹⁹ cm⁻³. The measurements were performed on 300 nm thin doped films deposited on high-quality thick undoped GaN films. With this sample structure, influences of the Si dopant induced decrease of the crystalline quality on the XSW signal are suppressed. The XSW data are compared to those obtained from thick homogeneously doped GaN films. All XSW measurements were performed in (002) backscattering geometry. Independent of the dopant concentration, the results indicate that Si atoms are solely incorporated on substitutional Ga sites.