Correction: Selective area growth of GaN nanowires and nanofins by molecular beam epitaxy on heteroepitaxial diamond (001) substrates

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1039/D1NA00221J.].

Environmental sensitivity of GaN nanofins grown by selective area molecular beam epitaxy

Nanostructures exhibit a large surface-to-volume ratio, which makes them sensitive to their ambient conditions. In particular, GaN nanowires and nanofins react to their environment as adsorbates influence their (opto-) electronic properties. Charge transfer between the semiconductor surface and adsorbed species changes the surface band bending of the nanostructures, and the adsorbates can alter the rate of non-radiative recombination in GaN. Despite the importance of these interactions with the ambient environment, the detailed adsorption mechanisms are still not fully understood. In this article, we present a systematic study concerning the environmental sensitivity of the electrical conductivity of GaN nanofins. We identify oxygen- and water-based adsorbates to be responsible for a quenching of the electrical current through GaN nanofins due to an increased surface band bending. Complementary contact potential difference measurements in controlled atmospheres on bulkm- andc-plane GaN reveal additional complexity with regard to water adsorption, for which surface dipoles might play an important role besides an increased surface depletion width. The sensitive reaction of the electrical parameters to the environment and surface condition underlines the necessity of a reproducible pre-treatment and/or surface passivation. The presented results help to further understand the complex adsorption mechanisms at GaN surfaces. Due to the sensitivity of the nanofin conductivity on the environment, such structures could perform well as sensing devices.

Influence of environmental conditions and surface treatments on the photoluminescence properties of GaN nanowires and nanofins

Due to their intrinsically large surface-to-volume ratio, nanowires and nanofins interact strongly with their environment. We investigate the role of the main air constituents nitrogen, oxygen and water on the efficiency of radiative recombination in GaN nanostructures as a function of different surface treatments and at temperatures up to 200 °C. Oxygen and water exposures exhibit a complex behavior as they can both act quenching and enhancing on the photoluminescence intensity dependent on the temperature. For oxygen, these characteristics are already observed for low concentrations of below 0.5% in nitrogen. While the photoluminescence intensity changes induced by oxygen occur independently of illumination, the influence of water is light-induced: it evolves within tens of seconds under ultraviolet light exposure and is heavily influenced by the nanostructure pre-treatment. In contrast to observations in dry atmospheres, water prevents a recovery of the photoluminescence intensity in the dark. Combined measurements of the electrical current through GaN nanofins and their photoluminescence intensity reveal the environmental influence on the interaction of non-radiative recombination processes and changes in the surface band bending of the nanostructures. Several investigated solvents show an enhancing effect on the PL intensity increase, peaking in c-hexane with a 26-fold increase after 6 min of light exposure. Stabilization of the PL intensity was achieved by a passivation of the GaN surface with Ga_xO_y, and ZnO shells. Surprisingly, Al₂O₃coatings resulted in a highly instable PL intensity during the first minutes of illumination. Our findings reveal the high importance of controlled environmental conditions for the investigation of nanostructures, especially when aimed at their applications in the fields of environmental sensing, photo-catalysis and light-emitting diodes.

Selective area growth of GaN nanowires and nanofins by molecular beam epitaxy on heteroepitaxial diamond (001) substrates

GaN-on-diamond is a promising route towards reliable high-power transistor devices with outstanding performances due to better heat management, replacing common GaN-on-SiC technologies. Nevertheless, the implementation of GaN-on-diamond remains challenging. In this work, the selective area growth of GaN nanostructures on cost-efficient, large-scale available heteroepitaxial diamond (001) substrates by means of plasma-assisted molecular beam epitaxy is investigated. Additionally, we discuss the influence of an AlN buffer on the morphology of the GaN nanostructures. The nanowires and nanofins are characterized by a very high selectivity and controllable dimensions. Low temperature photoluminescence measurements are used to evaluate their structural quality. The growth of two GaN crystal domains, which are in-plane rotated against each other by 30°, is observed. The favoring of a certain domain is determined by the off-cut direction of the diamond substrates. By X-ray diffraction we show that the GaN nanostructures grow perpendicular to the diamond surface on off-cut diamond (001) substrates, which is in contrast to the growth on diamond (111), where the nanostructures are aligned with the substrate lattice. Polarity-selective wet chemical etching and Kelvin probe force microscopy reveal that the GaN nanostructures grow solely in the Ga-polar direction. This is a major advantage compared to the growth on diamond (111) and enables the application of GaN nanostructures on cost-efficient diamond for high-power/high-frequency applications.