• Journal of Ceramic Processing Research
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• v.13 no.spc1
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• pp.75-77
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• 2012

The AlGaN-based vertical light-emitting diodes (LEDs) on thick GaN epilayer were fabricated by a hydride vapor phase epitaxy with multi sliding boat system. The optical and electrical characteristics of AlGaN-based vertical LEDs were evaluated using a scanning electron microscopy, electroluminescence and I-V measurements. The AlGaN-based vertical LEDs structure has hexagonal symmetry, 500 ㎛ in diameter and above 67 ㎛ in growth thickness. At the room-temperature, the broaded strong peak and relatively high intensity peak were gradually measured at 405 nm with increasing injection current. And a forward operator voltage was measured to be about 7.5 V.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2010.03a
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• pp.16-16
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• 2010

GaN-based light-emitting diodes (LEDs) are attracting great interest as candidates for next-generation solid-state lighting, because of their long lifetime, small size, high efficacy, and low energy consumption. However, for general illumination applications, the external quantum efficiency of LEDs, determined by the internal quantum efficiency (IQE) and the light extraction efficiency, must be further increased. The IQE is determined by crystal quality and epitaxial layer structure and high value of IQE more than 70% for blue LEDs have been already reported. However, there is much room for improvement of light extraction efficiency because most of the generated photons from active layer remain inside LEDs by total internal reflection at the interface of semiconductor with air due to the high refractive index difference between LEDs epilayer (for GaN, n=2.5) and air (n=1). The light confining in LEDs will be reabsorbed by the metal electrode or active layer, reducing the efficacy of LEDs. Here, we present the first demonstration of enhanced light extraction by forming a MgO nano-pyramids structure on the surface of vertical-LEDs. The MgO nano-pyramids structure was successfully fabricated at room temperature using conventional electron-beam evaporation without any additional process. The nano-sized pyramids of MgO are formed on the surface during growth due to anisotropic characteristics between (111) and (200) plane of MgO. The ZnO layer with quarter-wavelength in thickness is inserted between GaN and MgO layers to increase the critical angle for total internal reflection, because the refractive index of ZnO (n=1.94) could be matched between GaN (n=2.5) and MgO (n=1.73). The MgO nano-pyramids structure and ZnO refractive-index modulation layer enhanced the light extraction efficiency ofV-LEDs with by 49%, comparing with the V-LEDs with a flat n-GaN surface. The angular-dependent emission intensity shows the enhanced light extraction through the side walls of V-LEDs as well as through the top surface of the n-GaN, because of the increase in critical angle for total internal reflection as well as light scattering at the MgO nano-pyramids surface.

• Journal of Ceramic Processing Research
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• v.13 no.spc2
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• pp.295-299
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• 2012

We investigated the crystal and the optical properties of GaN-based blue light emitting diodes (LEDs) which were simultaneously grown on c-plane (0001) and semipolar (11-22) GaN templates by using metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD). The X-ray rocking curves (XRCs) full width at half maximums (FWHMs) of c-plane (0001) and semipolar (11-22) GaN templates were 275 and 889 arcsec, respectively. In addition, high-resolution X-ray ω-2θ scan showed that satellite peaks of semipolar (11-22) InGaN quantum-wells (QWs) was weaker and broader than that of c-plane (0001) InGaN QWs, indicating that the interface quality of c-plane (0001) QWs was superior to that of semipolar (11-22) QWs. Photoluminescence (PL) and electroluminescence (EL) results showed that the emission intensity and the FWHMs of polar c-plane (0001) LED were much higher and narrower than those of semipolar (11-22) LED, respectively. From these results, we believed that relative poor crystal quality of semipolar (11-22) GaN template might give rise to the poor interfacial quality of QWs, resulting in lower output power than conventional c-plane (0001) GaN-based LEDs.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2011.02a
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• pp.145-145
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• 2011

Light-emitting diodes (LEDs) based on III-nitrides compound semiconductors have achieved a high performance device available for display and illumination sector. However, the conventional c-plane oriented LED structures are still showing several problems given by the quantum confined Stark effect (QCSE) due to the effects of strong piezoelectric and spontaneous polarizations. The QCSE results in spatial separation of electron and hole wavefunctions in quantum wells, thereby decreasing the internal quantum efficiency and red-shifting the emission wavelength. Due to demands for improvement of device performance, nonpolar structure has been attracting attentions, since the quantum wells grown on nonpolar templates are free from the QCSE. However, current device performance for nonpolar LEDs is still lower than those for conventional LEDs. In this study, we discuss the potential possibilities of nonpolar LEDs for commercialization. In this study, we characterized current-light output power relation of the a-plane InGaN/GaN LEDs structures with the variation of quantum well structures. On-wafer electroluminescence measurements were performed with short pulse (10 us) and low duty factor (1 %) conditions applied for eliminating thermal effects. The well and barrier widths, and indium compositions in quantum well structures were changed to analyze the efficiency droop phenomenon.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2012.02a
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• pp.108-108
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• 2012

High-performance GaN-based light emitting diodes (LEDs) with high efficiency and excellent reliability have been of technological importance forapplications in full color display, automotive lighting, and solid state lighting. To realize high-performance and excellent-reliability LEDs, various technologies such as surface texturing, transparent conducting oxide, surface Plasmon, highly p-conduction layer, current blocking layer, photon-enhanced layer, and nanostructures have been extensively investigated. Among them, advanced core technologies based on how to suppress surface leakage and current crowding, how to enhance current injection efficiency and output power, and how to resist electrostatic damage will be displayed and discussed using our reported and preliminary results. New approaches like integrated LEDs will be also introduced and discussed.

• 한국정보디스플레이학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2007.08a
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• pp.471-472
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• 2007

We have demonstrated that the light extraction efficiency of GaN based light emitting diodes (LEDs) can be significantly enhanced by using photonic crystal and microcavity (PCMC) effects. It was found that the extraction efficiency of the PCMC-LEDs is 9.5 times larger than that of the normal LEDs.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.19 no.8
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• pp.775-779
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• 2006

In this study, sputtered $Al_2O_3$ thin films were evaluated as a passivation layer in the process of InGaN-based blue LEDs in order to improve the brightness of LED lamps. In terms of packaged LED lamps, lamps with $Al_2O_3$ passivation layer emanated higher brightness than those with $SiO_2$ passivation layer, and LED lamps with 90 nm $Al_2O_3$ passivation layer were the brightest among four kinds of lamps. Although lamps with $Al_2O_3$ passivation had a slight increase in operating voltage, their brightness was improved about 13.6 % compare to the lamps made of conventional LEDs without the changes of emitting wavelength.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2010.08a
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• pp.157-157
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• 2010

Vertical-structure light-emitting diodes (V-LEDs) by laser lift-off (LLO) have been exploited for high-efficiency GaN-based LEDs of solid-state lightings. In V-LEDs, emitted light from active regions is reflected-up from reflective ohmic contacts on p-GaN. Therefore, silver (Ag) is very suitable for reflective contacts due to its high reflectance (>95%) and surface plasmon coupling to visible light emissions. In addition, low contact resistivity has been obtained from Ag-based ohmic contacts annealed in oxygen ambient. However, annealing in oxygen ambient causes Ag to be oxidized and/or agglomerated, leading to degradation in both electrical and optical properties. Therefore, preventing Ag from oxidation and/or agglomeration is a key aspect for high-performance V-LEDs. In this work, we demonstrate the enhanced thermal stability of Ag-based Ohmic contact to p-GaN by reducing the thermal compressive stress. The thermal compressive stress due to the large difference in CTE between GaN ($5.6{\times}10^{-6}/^{\circ}C$) and Ag ($18.9{\times}10^{-6}/^{\circ}C$) accelerate the diffusion of Ag atoms, leading to Ag agglomeration. Therefore, by increasing the additional residual tensile stress in Ag film, the thermal compressive stress could be reduced, resulting in the enhancement of Ag agglomeration resistance. We employ the thin Ni layer in Ag film to form Ni/Ag mutli-layer structure, because the lattice constant of NiO ($4.176\;{\AA}$ is larger than that of Ag ($4.086\;{\AA}$). High-resolution symmetric and asymmetric X-ray diffraction was used to measure the in-plane strain of Ag films. Due to the expansion of lattice constant by oxidation of Ni into NiO layer, Ag layer in Ni/Ag multi-layer structure was tensilely strained after annealing. Based on experimental results, it could be concluded that the reduction of thermal compressive stress by additional tensile stress in Ag film plays a critical role to enhance the thermal stability of Ag-based Ohmic contact to p-GaN.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.50-50
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• 2008

ZnO has been extensively studied for optoelectronic applications such as blue and ultraviolet (UV) light emitters and detectors, because it has a wide band gap (3.37 eV) anda large exciton binding energy of ~60 meV over GaN (~26 meV). However, the fabrication of the light emitting devices using ZnO homojunctions is suffered from the lack of reproducibility of the p-type ZnO with high hall concentration and mobility. Thus, the ZnO-based p-n heterojunction light emitting diode (LED) using p-Si and p-GaN would be expected to exhibit stable device performance compared to the homojunction LED. The n-ZnO/p-GaN heterostructure is a good candidate for ZnO-based heterojunction LEDs because of their similar physical properties and the reproducibleavailability of p-type GaN. Especially, the reduced lattice mismatch (~1.8 %) and similar crystal structure result in the advantage of acquiring high performance LED devices with low defect density. However, the electroluminescence (EL) of the device using n-ZnO/p-GaN heterojunctions shows the blue and greenish emissions, which are attributed to the emission from the p-GaN and deep-level defects. In this work, the n-ZnO:Ga/p-GaN:Mg heterojunction light emitting diodes (LEDs) were fabricated at different growth temperatures and carrier concentrations in the n-type region. The effects of the growth temperature and carrier concentration on the electrical and emission properties were investigated. The I-V and the EL results showed that the device performance of the heterostructure LEDs, such as turn-on voltage and true ultraviolet emission, developed through the insertion of a thin intrinsic layer between n-ZnO:Ga and p-GaN:Mg. This observation was attributed to a lowering of the energy barriers for the supply of electrons and holes into intrinsic ZnO, and recombination in the intrinsic ZnO with the absence of deep level emission.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2010.06a
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• pp.159-159
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• 2010

We conducted bum-in test by current stress to evaluate acceleration reliability characteristics about p-resistivity influence of GaN-based light-emitting diodes. The LEDs used in this study are the polarization field-induced LED(PF-LED) having low p-resistivity and the highly resistive LED(HR-LED) having high p-resistivity. The result of high stress experiment shows that current crowding phenomenon is occurred from the center of between p-bonding pad and n-bonding pad to either electrodes. In addition, series resistance and optical power decrease dramatically. These results means that the resistance of between p-bonding pad and p-GaN affect reliability. That's why we need to consider the ohmic contact of p-bonding pad when design the high efficiency and high reliability LEDs.