High performance quantum cascade lasers at λ∼6 μm

This talk will focus on the recent efforts at the Center for Quantum Devices to deliver a high average power quantum cascade laser source at λ∼6 μm. Strain-balancing is used to reduce leakage for these shorter wavelength quantum cascade lasers. Further, the effect of reducing the doping in the injector is explored relative to the threshold current density and maximum average output power. Lastly, to demonstrate more of the potential of these devices, epilayer down bonding is explored as a technique to significantly enhance device performance.     

Room-temperature continuous-wave operation of long wavelength (l ?9.5 lm) MOVPE-grown quantum cascade lasers

High-power continuous-wave operation of long wavelength quantum cascade lasers grown by metal organic vapour phase epitaxy is reported. The lasers have been processed as buried heterostructures with thick gold-plated contacts. The devices emit at a wavelength of 9.5 mum with output powers of several hundreds of milliwatts at room temperature.     

Power rectifier model including self heating effects

A compact circuit model for power PiN diode is presented in this paper. The model includes thermal and electrical characteristics. Emitter efficiency effect, voltage drop due to epilayer region and accurate modeling of reverse recovery and forward recovery are main features of the electric part of the model. The thermal part of the model dynamically takes into account heat generation and flow through the device and includes the effect of temperature on diode model parameters. Circuit implementation of device thermal equations includes the effect of the non uniform heat generation in the chip and, hence, is very effective in modeling thermal response to short current pulses, which give a substantial modification of power rectifiers characteristics with negligible case heating. Modeling of charge distribution in the epilayer and of heat flow, is achieved through an approximation of the Laplace transform of the exact solution. The model is implemented as a Pspice subcircuit. Medici device simulations, including self heating, are used to validate the Pspice model.     

Distributed-feedback quantum cascade lasers emitting in the 9-μmband with InP top cladding layers

Two different high performance quantum cascade distributed-feedback lasers with four quantum-well-based active regions and InP top cladding layers are presented. The first device, which emitted at 9.5 μm, was mounted junction down in order to get high average powers of up to 71 mW at -30°C and 30 mW at room temperature. The other device, which lased at 9.1 μm, was optimized for high pulsed operating temperatures and tested up to 150°C at 1.5% duty cycle. The emission of both lasers stayed single mode with more than 20-dB side-mode suppression ratio over the entire investigated power and temperature range     

Room temperature continuous-wave operation of quantum-cascade lasers grown by metal organic vapour phase epitaxy

Quantum cascade lasers grown by metal organic vapour phase epitaxy are demonstrated to work in continuous mode up to room temperature. The lasers have been processed as buried heterostructures with thick gold plating on the top contact. Continuous-wave output powers of 20 mW are obtained at 300 K with threshold current densities of 3.9 kA/cm/sup 2/.     

Continuous-wave operation of GaInAs-AlGaAsSb quantum cascade lasers

We report on the demonstration of continuous-wave (CW) operation of GaInAs-AlGaAsSb quantum cascade (QC) lasers. By placing a 2.5-/spl mu/m-thick gold layer on both sides of the laser ridge to extract heat from the active region in the lateral direction, together with mounting the device epilayer down, we have achieved CW operation of GaInAs-AlGaAsSb QC lasers composed of 25 stages of active/injection regions. The maximum CW operating temperature of the lasers is 94 K, and the emission wavelength is around /spl lambda//spl sim/4.65 /spl mu/m. For a device with the size of 10/spl times/2000 /spl mu/m/sup 2/, the CW optical output power per facet is 13 mW at 42 K and 4 mW at 94 K. The CW threshold current density is 1.99 kA/cm/sup 2/ at 42 K, and 2.08 kA/cm/sup 2/ at 94 K, respectively.     

多层GaN外延片表面热应力分布及影响因素

为了研究蓝宝石/AlN/GaN外延片表面层热应力分布及影响因素,以直径d为40 mm的外延片为研究对象,利用有限元分析法对其表面热应力分布进行了理论计算和仿真,验证了仿真模型的合理性。分析了外延片生长温度、蓝宝石衬底和AlN过渡层厚度对表面热应力的影响。结果显示:在1 200℃的生长温度下,外延片径向应力比轴向应力大一个量级;在径向（d32 mm）区域内的热应力分布比较均匀,热应力变化范围为0.38%;生长温度在600~1 200℃范围内,外延层表面应力与生长温度呈近似正比关系。研究成果可为该类外延片生长工艺研究和低应力外延片的筛选标准制定提供借鉴。     

Molecular Beam Epitaxy of Materials Interfaces with Atomic Precision

In this contribution a few selected examples to engineer material interfaces in nanostructured solids with atomic precision by means of molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) are presented. The examples include 2D electron gas systems for quantum transport and mesoscopic physics, quantum cascade lasers, Sb-based materials, ferromagnet-semiconductor heterostructures, as well as oxide materials for electronics and quantum physics. Finally, the prospects to fabricate novel van-der-Waals heterostructures are briefly discussed.     

Analysis of Terahertz Radiation Spectra in Multilayer GaAs/AlGaAs Heterostructures

The results of examination of the terahertz radiation spectra of multilayer GaAs/AlGaAs heterostructures synthesized on GaAs substrates are presented. The dependence of the radiation spectrum on the amplitude of the excitation current pulse and temperature dependences of the threshold lasing current and the radiation power of terahertz quantum cascade lasers with a double metallic waveguide, which were built on the basis of these structures, have been obtained. The maximum amplitude of the total radiation power is estimated at 28 μW in the range 3.25–3.32 THz at a temperature of 15 K. The spectral radiation density of the oscillator is measured. Changes in the mode content of radiation induced by the bias-current variation have been observed.     

The role of transport processes of nonequilibrium charge carriers in radiative properties of arrays of InAs/GaAs quantum dots

The results of time-resolved photoluminescence studies of heterostructures containing monolayer arrays of InAs/GaAs quantum dots are presented. A two-component time dependence of intensity of photoluminescence from the ground state of quantum dots, with characteristic times of the slow component up to hundreds of nanoseconds and those of rapid one several nanoseconds, is studied. It is shown that the slow component is determined by the transport of nonequilibrium charge carriers between the quantum dots. At low temperatures, the time of the slow component is determined by tunneling, and at high temperatures by thermal escape of nonequilibrium charge carriers. The ratio of the contributions of tunneling and thermal escape is determined by the degree of isolation of quantum dots. A theoretical model is constructed that describes the effect of the dynamics of carrier transport on the emergence and decay of the slow component of photoluminescence.     

Intervalley scattering in GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells and quantum cascade lasers

The results of simulations of Γ−X scattering in GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells are presented, discussing the importance of the mole fraction, doping density, and lattice and electron temperatures in determining the scattering rates. A systematic study of Γ−X scattering in GaAs/Al_xGa_1−xAs heterostructures, using a single quantum well to determine the importance of well width, molar concentration x, lattice temperature, and doping density, has been performed. After this we consider a double quantum well to determine the role of intervalley scattering in the transport through single-layer heterostructures, i.e. Γ−X−Γ scattering compared with Γ−Γ scattering. Finally, we estimate the relative importance of intervalley scattering in a GaAs-based quantum-cascade laser device and compare it with other relevant scattering mechanisms important to describe carrier dynamics in the structure. Our simulations suggest that Γ−X scattering can be significant at room temperature but falls off rapidly at lower temperatures.     

Enhanced arsenic diffusion and activation in HgCdTe

Temperature and time dependent Hg-annealing studies for arsenic activation have been carried out on As-doped molecular beam epitaxy HgCdTe eitherin situ or by ion implantation to determine the extent of arsenic activation in the single layer. Enhanced As diffusion and activation in double layer heterostructures have also been investigated to further our understanding of the effects on zero bias resistance-area product (R_oA) and quantum efficiency. The results show that the arsenic activation anneal is limited by Hg self-diffusion into the HgCdTe epilayer. Using this arsenic activation process for eitherin situ doped arsenic or implanted arsenic, high performance p-on-n double layer heterostructure photodiodes have been demonstrated on both mesa and planar device structures.     

Quantum coupling effects on charging dynamics of nanocrystalline memory devices

A model is proposed to account for the impacts of the quantum coupling between the longitudinal and transverse components of the channel electron motion on the charging dynamics of memory devices. The calculations demonstrate that the quantum coupling effects on the charging dynamics of Ge NC (germanium nanocrystalline) memory devices cannot be neglected for high temperature and drift velocity of the channel electrons higher than the thermal velocity. The calculations also show that the charging current of Ge NC memory devices strongly depends on the temperature, drift velocity and effective electron mass of the tunneling oxide layer. The reduction in the barrier height caused by the quantum coupling is its origin. The sensitivity of the effective electron mass of the tunneling oxide layer on the charging current of Ge NC memory devices is a potential method to improve the performance of device.     

Molecular-beam epitaxy growth and characterization of mid-infrared quantum cascade laser structures

The development of molecular-beam epitaxy (MBE) of GaAs/AlGaAs heterostructures, used for fabrication of ∼9 μm quantum cascade lasers (QCLs), is reported. The X-ray diffractometry (XRD) structural characterization, as an integral part of this process, is presented as well. Some conclusions, concerning the relationships between the used type of epitaxial technology and the necessity of special procedures of growth rate (V_gr) calibration, are reached. The influence of the structural features of the QCL active region on the electronic band structure is calculated, and consequently some predictions as to the device electrical properties are presented as well.     

C-V and C-t analysis of buried oxide layers formed by high-dose oxygen implantation

For silicon-on-insulator devices with very thin active layers, the quality of the buried oxide layer and its interface with the top silicon layer can significantly affect device performance. This study focuses on the characterization of buried oxide layers formed by high-dose oxygen implantation into Si wafers. Capacitance-voltage (C-V) and capac-itance-time (C-t) measurements were performed on the epilayer/buried oxide/substrate capacitors. From high frequency C-V measurements, data on fixed oxide charge, inter-face traps, and donor densities were obtained for both buried oxide interfaces, as well as the thickness of the buried oxide layer. From C-t measurements, minority carrier generation lifetimes were calculated for thin depletion regions on both sides of the buried oxide. The data is correlated to changes in implanted dose, anneal temperature, and anneal time.     

Multilayer heterostructures for quantum-cascade lasers operating in the terahertz frequency range

The results obtained in a study of the structural and optical properties of GaAs/AlGaAs heterostructures with 228 quantum cascades, grown by molecular-beam epitaxy, and in a simulation of interband optical transitions and transitions between the energy levels of a cascade are presented.     

Characterization and modeling of quantum cascade lasers based on aphoton-assisted tunneling transition

A detailed characterization and modeling of long-wavelength (λ~10 μm) quantum cascade (QC) lasers based on a photon-assisted tunneling transition are presented. In particular, the influence of the finite lifetime of the lower state of the laser transition on the current-voltage and threshold current versus temperature characteristics have been studied both theoretically and experimentally. It is shown that, for our structure, the value of the lower state lifetime can be extracted from the voltage-current curve; the value we found was 2.6 ps. In addition, this model allows to understand the abrupt degradation of the performance of the device for T>150 K. Low temperature (T=10 K) threshold current densities of 1.1 kA/cm² and a tuning range of 85 cm^-1 in pulsed mode are reported. In continuous-wave mode, the emission linewidth of a free-running laser was determined to be 3.9 MHz     

Nano-engineering approaches to self-assembled InAs quantum dot laser medium

A number of nano-engineering methods are proposed and tested to improve optical properties of a laser gain medium using the self-assembled InAs quantum dot (QD) ensemble. The laser characteristics of concern include higher gain, larger modulation bandwidth, higher efficiency at elevated temperatures, higher thermal stability, and enhanced reliability. The focus of this paper is on the management of QD properties through design and molecular beam epitaxial growth and modification of QD heterostructures. This includes digital alloys as high-quality wide-bandgap barrier; under- and overlayers with various compositions to control the dynamics of QD formation and evolution on the surface; shape engineering of QDs to improve electron-hole overlap and reduce inhomogeneous broadening; band engineering of QD heterostructures to enhance the carrier localization by reduction of thermal escape from dots; as well as tunnel injection from quantum wells (QWs) to accelerate carrier transfer to the lasing state. Beneficial properties of the developed QD media are demonstrated at room temperature in laser diodes with unsurpassed thermal stability with a characteristic temperature of 380 K, high waveguide modal gain >50 cm⁻¹, unsurpassed defect tolerance over two orders of magnitude higher than that of QWs typically used in lasers, and efficient emission from a two-dimensional (2-D) photonic crystal nanocavity.     

A noise model for high electron mobility transistors

A model to explain the noise properties for AlGaAs/GaAs HEMT's, AlGaAs/InGaAs/GaAs pseudomorphic HEMT's (P-HEMT's) and GaAs/AlGaAs inverted HEMT's (I-HEMT's) is presented. The model Is based on a self-consistent solution of Schrodinger and Poisson's equations. The influence of the drain-source current, frequency and device parameters on the minimum noise figure F_min and minimum noise temperature T_min, for different HEMT structures are presented. The study shows that P-HEMT's have a better noise performance than the normal and inverted HEMT's. The present model predicts that a long gate P-HEMT device will exhibit a better noise performance than a conventional HEMT. There is a range of doped epilayer thickness where minimum noise figure is a minimum for pseudomorphic HEMT's which is not observed in conventional and inverted HEMT's. The calculated noise properties are compared with experimental data and the results show excellent agreement for all devices     

基于等效电容法对SOI器件自加热效应研究

针对目前常规SOI器件高温特性存在的问题,提出了采用等效电容法分析器件自加热效应的新观点,对抑制自加热效应原理进行了新的解析,根据埋层材料的介电常数不同,按等效电容法进行埋层厚度折算。在此基础上,提出了SOI器件的埋层新结构,并从介电常数的角度较好地验证了提出观点的正确性。最后得到,高介电常数等效埋层厚度的减小利于热泄散,高热导率的埋层材料提高了导热能力,在双重因素作用下有效抑制了自加热效应。