Defect reduction in (112_O) a-plane GaN by two-stage epitaxiallateral overgrowth

In the epitaxial lateral overgrowth (ELO) of (11{bar 2}0) a-plane GaN, the uneven growth rates of two opposing wings, Ga- and N-wings, makes the coalescence of two neighboring wings more difficult than that in c-plane GaN. We report a two-stage growth method to get uniformly coalesced epitaxial lateral overgrown a-plane GaN using metalorganic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) by employing relatively lower growth temperature in the first step followed by enhanced lateral growth in the second. Using this method, the height differences between Ga-polar and N-polar wings at the coalescence front could be reduced, thereby making the coalescence of two wings much easier. Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) showed that the threading dislocation density in the wing areas was 1.0x10{sup 8}cm{sup -2}, more than two orders of magnitude lower than that in the window areas (4.2x10{sup 10}cm{sup -2}). However, high density of basal stacking faults of 1.2x104 cm-1 was still observed in the wing areas as compared to c-plane GaN. Atomic force microscopy and photoluminescence measurements on the coalesced ELO a-GaN sample also indicated improved material quality