Effect of Dislocation-related Deep Levels in Heteroepitaxial InGaAs/GaAs and GaAsSb/GaAs p–i–n Structures on the Relaxation time of Nonequilibrium Carriers

Abstract

The results of an experimental study of the capacitance–voltage (C–V) characteristics and deep-level transient spectroscopy (DLTS) spectra of p⁺–p⁰–i–n⁰ homostructures based on undoped dislocationfree GaAs layers and InGaAs/GaAs and GaAsSb/GaAs heterostructures with homogeneous networks of misfit dislocations, all grown by liquid-phase epitaxy (LPE), are presented. Deep-level acceptor defects identified as HL2 and HL5 are found in the epitaxial p⁰ and n⁰ layers of the GaAs-based structure. The electron and hole dislocation-related deep levels, designated as, respectively, ED1 and HD3, are detected in InGaAs/GaAs and GaAsSb/GaAs heterostructures. The following hole trap parameters: thermal activation energies (E_t), capture cross sections (σ_p), and concentrations (N_t) are calculated from the Arrhenius dependences to be E_t = 845 meV, σ_p = 1.33 × 10^–12 cm², N_t = 3.80 × 10¹⁴ cm^–3 for InGaAs/GaAs and E_t = 848 meV, σ_p = 2.73 × 10^–12 cm², N_t = 2.40 × 10¹⁴ cm^–3 for GaAsSb/GaAs heterostructures. The concentration relaxation times of nonequilibrium carriers are estimated for the case in which dislocation-related deep acceptor traps are involved in this process. These are 2 × 10^–10 s and 1.5 × 10^–10 s for, respectively, the InGaAs/GaAs and GaAsSb/GaAs heterostructures and 1.6 × 10^–6 s for the GaAs homostructures.