Aspects of the present disclosure generally relates to semiconductor devices, and more specifically relates to using a quantum-structure lattice array to control the light emission properties of a semiconductor quantum well structure.
Spontaneous and stimulated optical emissions properties of semiconductor active regions may predominately control the performance of optoelectronic emitters such as lasers, light-emitting diodes (LEDs), and single-photon emitters. Such spontaneous emissions properties may be controlled by the environment surrounding the light emitter. For example, optical microcavities in the form of photonic crystals, distributed Bragg reflectors (DBRs), distributed feedback structures (DFBs), and optical waveguides have all been proposed as ways to enhance, attenuate, or suppress spontaneous emissions by changing the density of associated electromagnetic states.
Because passive microcavities does not emit light in of itself, quantum wells and quantum dots are often used as light emitters in the active region of microcavities. Such quantum wells and quantum dots may typically be used for emission wavelength selection via quantum size effects.
According to one aspect of the present disclosure, a quantum well of an active region of a semiconductor device comprises a quantum structure lattice having lattice geometries that satisfies a Bragg condition, such that inter-quantum structure distance d between a first quantum structure and a second quantum structure within the quantum structure lattice is an integer multiple of a emission half wavelength mλo/2n, where m is an integer, λo is a wavelength in free space, and n is a refractive index of a cladding material of the quantum well.
According to another aspect of the present disclosure, a method for forming a semiconductor device comprises forming, within a quantum well of an active region of the semiconductor device, a quantum structure lattice having lattice geometries that satisfies a Bragg condition, such that inter-quantum structure distance d between a first quantum structure and a second quantum structure within the quantum structure lattice is an integer multiple of a emission half wavelength mλo/2n, where m is an integer, λo is a wavelength in free space, and n is a refractive index of a cladding material of the quantum well.
These and other features, aspects and advantages of the present disclosure will become better understood with reference to the following drawings, description and claims.
a), 4(b), and 4(c) show the quantum well energy band structures of quantum structure lattices in accordance with an embodiment of the present disclosure;
The following detailed description is of the best currently contemplated modes of carrying out exemplary embodiments of the disclosure. The description is not to be taken in a limiting sense, but is made merely for the purpose of illustrating the general principles of the disclosure, since the scope of the disclosure is best defined by the appended claims.
Various inventive features are described below that can each be used independently of one another or in combination with other features.
Broadly, embodiments of the present disclosure generally provide a quantum-structure lattice (QSL) with in-plane two dimensional distributed feedback (DFB) that may be formed to control the light emission properties of a quantum well on a semiconductor device.
The QSL design may be used to extend the emission wavelength of light emitters, such as LEDs. Because the emission wavelength of light emitters may be controlled by the interaction between the quantum well natural wavelength and the Bragg condition offered by the QSL, the emission wavelength of light emitters may be tuned by selecting suitable lattice geometries for the QSL that satisfies the Bragg condition. The photoluminescence peak of QSLs may be controlled to blue-shift, red-shift, or remain unchanged from the peak wavelength of as-grown quantum wells through a phonon-assisted recombination process, thus offering the freedom of selecting the appropriate emission wavelength for applications where an appropriate emission wavelength differs from that of the quantum well (QW) emission wavelength.
The QSL design may also be used to shape light emission patterns of light emitters into a narrow angle to enhance the extraction efficiency of LEDs as well as to lower the threshold current of injection lasers. Such shaping of emission energy patterns into anisotropic patterns may be achieved via in-plane resonance due to the periodic structure of the QSL design.
The QSL design may also show a smaller temperature dependency of the spontaneous emission wavelength as compared to the QW emission wavelength.
In accordance with an embodiment of the present disclosure, a quantum-structure lattice in the quantum well of an active region of a semiconductor device may be a periodic one-dimensional or two-dimensional grating or lattice array of gain material in the form of relatively uniform (having a less than or equal to about 10% variation) quantum boxes, quantum wires, or quantum dots. The two-dimensional grating or lattice array of gain material may also form two-dimensional patterns of quantum structures, such as a square quantum box pattern or a triangular quantum box pattern. When the quantum-structure lattice is structured so that the periodicity of the active lattice elements is designed to be an integer multiplication of the half wavelength of the optical emission from each of the lattice elements, the constructive optical interaction due to Bragg scattering may effectively make the quantum-structure lattice a high-Q cavity with the ability to actively emit optical radiation having certain designed emission properties. The quantum-structure lattice may include quantum boxes used as active lattice units in the quantum structure lattice and arranged in the square arrays fabricated in strained InGaAs/GaAs quantum wells. The uniform quantum box arrays may provide Bragg diffractions from periodic perturbances of the gain medium of the quantum-structure lattice array. This structure may offer the possibility of forming two-dimensional distributed feedback (DFB) not relying on the perturbations of the refractive index.
With reference to
With reference to
The mold 212 may impress a designed pattern, such as a perpendicular crossbar array having 100×100 nm2 openings on a 200 nm pitch that yields an array density of 2.5×109 cm−2, with the average diameter of the mold 212 for pillar etchings being about 80 nm.
Alternatively, instead of wet etching, the design pattern may be transferred to the structure via ion implantation or ion diffusion together with an impurity-induced layer disordering process.
It should be understood that the above-described method discloses one of many embodiments for forming quantum structure lattices, and that quantum structure lattices may also be formed by any other known method.
Further, in addition to GaAs substrates (including InGaAs, InGaP, AlGaAs, GaInAlP, and GaAsP systems), quantum structure lattices may also be formed on InP substrates (including GaInAsP, AlGaInAs, and AlGaInSb systems), GaN-based systems (AlGaInN grown on sapphire, on SiC, on GaN, and on Si), and Si system (SiGe on Si), as well as any other known systems.
The spontaneous emission properties of the QSL as compared with as-grown quantum well samples may be characterized using PL measurements. The QSL and as-grown quantum well samples may be measured at room temperature or at 77 kelvin (K) in a liquid nitrogen-cooled cryostat, and the samples may be excited using a frequency-doubled yttrium aluminum garnet (YAG) laser source with a wavelength of 532 nm. The signal may be detected by a liquid nitrogen-cooled germanium photodetector in a 0.5-meter spectrometer with a lock-in amplifier.
Graph (a) of
The averaged diameter of the quantum boxes may be about 38 nm. The 77 K PL spectrum of the QSL array shows a peak centered at 1.318 eV, which is a 30 meV blue-shift from that of the as-grown QW sample (1.348 eV). In this QSL sample, the spontaneous emission may involve both electron-hole recombination and phonon absorption recombination processes. Both the QSL sample and the original QW show a narrow PL spectrum with a full-width at half maximum (FWHM) ˜8 meV indicating the emission wavelengths from all QBs in the QSL array may be nearly identical. The spontaneous emission wavelength of the QSL may be determined by fulfilling the in-plane Bragg diffraction condition with the phonon-assisted QB emissions. Due to the proximity of QBs to the sample surface (≦25 nm), the effective periodic refractive index change near the surface may be quite small and a complete photonic bandgap will not be formed. In PhC structures, on the other hand, significant periodic index change (Δ
Since the average diameter of etched pillars containing InGaAs quantum boxes may be about 38 nm, the in-plane quantum size effect should not contribute significantly to the large blue shift of the measured PL spectrum of the quantum structure lattice array sample. In this case, the calculated integer m that fulfills the Bragg condition may be 8, and the nearest resonant neighbors may be located at (±2, ±5)a and (±5, ±2)a of the QSL from the origin.
Graph (b) of
Graph (c) of
Further insight of the spontaneous emissions behavior of QSLs may be gained by comparing the energy band structures of various QSLs.
b) shows the QW energy band structure of a QSL fabricated from a 7.5 nm In0.075Ga0.925As/GaAs strained QW structure (Sample B from above). In Sample B, the conduction band discontinuity ΔEC=24 meV may be smaller than that of sample A (ΔEC=95 meV), such that the ground state in the Sample B QW is very close to the conduction band edge of GaAs barriers. Using the material parameters determined by DCXD rocking curves, i.e., xInAs=0.074 and ≈=7.8 nm, the derived Sample B QW ground state transition energy may be the same as the measured value of 1.447 eV. The measured spontaneous emission wavelength of the Sample B QSL is 1.382 eV, which is 65 meV (about two phonon energy, ΔE=2hωLO(GaAs)≈0.072 eV) below the Sample B QW ground state transition energy. Therefore, the spontaneous emission of a QSL array involves not only electron-hole recombination but also phonon absorption/emission.
Phonon-assisted absorptions may be common in indirect band gap semiconductors, and phonon-assisted laser operation hωLO below the confined QW transition energy have been demonstrated in InGaAs/GaAs/AlGaAs QW heterostructures. By tuning the photon lifetime through cavity reflectivity adjustment, QW lasers may be operated via band-to-band recombination and/or phonon-assisted recombination. Since cavity resonance contribution is minimal in spontaneous emission processes, phonon-assisted spontaneous emission has not been observed.
However, in accordance with embodiments of the present disclosure, phonon-assisted spontaneous emission may clearly be displayed in QSL arrays embedded with a 2D QB emitter array (an in-plane resonant cavity) in the active region. The periodic arrangement of QB emitters may allow the fulfillment of in-plane Bragg diffraction conditions of the QSL by many wavelengths and along different in-plane directions. Under the photo-excitation, the PL wavelength of the QSL may be determined by either the original QW emission energy or the QW emission energy assisted by phonon emission or absorption, provided that the PL spectral of the QSL is narrow. If the periodic QB emitters have a wide spread of spontaneous emission wavelengths, such as in site-controlled quantum dots (SCQDs), only a limited number of wavelengths can match the same Bragg condition, then the phonon-assisted spontaneous emission may not be observed.
c) shows the QW energy band structure of a QSL fabricated from a 10 nm In0.22Ga0.78As/GaAs strained quantum well structure (Sample C from above). In QSL arrays, when ΔEC of the QW is much greater than the phonon energy, as in Samples A and C (ΔEC=123 eV), the spontaneous emission of the QSL array can take two forms: It can oscillate at the QW emission wavelength as shown in
The origin of the spontaneous emission properties from a QSL may be further revealed from the temperature dependency of its emission peak wavelength. In commonly used DFB structures, the active region and the grating are located in adjacent regions. The temperature-dependent spontaneous emission peak wavelength may, therefore, not determined by the grating structure due to the finite coupling of the optical field with the grating. The temperature shift of the bandgap energy of the active region may still dominate the spontaneous emission peak wavelength. Only under the stimulated emission condition, due to the strong interaction with the grating structure, may the DFB emission follow the temperature shift of the grating. In the QSL array case, the 2D QB array may act as both light emitters as well as a 2D grating ensuring a maximum coupling between the active light emitters and the grating structure. Thus, the QB spacing may play a major role in determining the temperature-dependent spontaneous emission wavelength of a QSL array. Thus, the emission peak wavelength of a QSL may predominately be determined by the Bragg condition of the 2D QB array and its temperature dependency of the diffractive index of the QW as in a DFB structure. Therefore the shift of the emission peak wavelength of a QSL may be much less sensitive than a QW structure as the surrounding temperature varies.
In addition to spontaneous emission wavelength control, the radiation patterns emanating from a QSL array may be manipulated without the use of an external microcavity, as in a PhC structure. Because each periodically distributed quantum box emitter in a QSL array may act as an electromagnetic radiation source, an entire QSL array can be seen as a planar one or two-dimensional antenna array having a radiation beam shape that may be controlled by the design of the QSL structure.
As shown in
The collimated angular dependent spontaneous emission results are similar to those observed in 2D DFB polymer lasers excited well below lasing threshold. Nevertheless, the PL spectrum of the 2D DFB polymer laser shows a pair of closely spaced peaks rather than a single peak in the QSL array. In contrast, the QW sample shows no angular dependency (not shown). Similarly, the radiation pattern of a non-uniform site-controlled quantum dot (SCQD) array fabricated using the same NIL mask (100×100 nm2 openings on a 200 nm rectangular pitch), which has a wide PL linewidth of ≧100 meV, shows no angular dependency. Due to the wide spread QD emission wavelengths of the SCQD array, the 2D DFB effect for a specific wavelength is greatly reduced. These results indicate that a uniform 2D QSL array may be essential for the 2D DFB effect.
The terminology used herein is for the purpose of describing particular embodiments only and is not intended to be limiting of the disclosure. As used herein, the singular forms “a”, “an” and “the” are intended to include the plural forms as well, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise. It will be further understood that the terms “comprises” and/or “comprising,” when used in this specification, specify the presence of stated features, integers, steps, operations, elements, and/or components, but do not preclude the presence or addition of one or more other features, integers, steps, operations, elements, components, and/or groups thereof.
The corresponding structures, materials, acts, and equivalents of all means or step plus function elements in the claims below are intended to include any structure, material, or act for performing the function in combination with other claimed elements as specifically claimed. The description of the present disclosure has been presented for purposes of illustration and description, but is not intended to be exhaustive or limited to the disclosure in the form disclosed. Many modifications and variations will be apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art without departing from the scope and spirit of the disclosure. The embodiment was chosen and described in order to best explain the principles of the disclosure and the practical application, and to enable others of ordinary skill in the art to understand the disclosure for various embodiments with various modifications as are suited to the particular use contemplated.
This application claims priority from U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/542,268 filed Oct. 2, 2011, the entire contents of which is incorporated herein by reference.
This disclosure was made with Government support under grant no W911NF-09-1-0490 awarded by the U.S. Army Research Office. The Government may have certain rights in this disclosure.
Number | Name | Date | Kind |
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20110037050 | Kim | Feb 2011 | A1 |
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20130230069 A1 | Sep 2013 | US |
Number | Date | Country | |
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61542268 | Oct 2011 | US |