Journal of Crystal Growth 127 (1993) 770—773 J o~ CRYSTAL

North-Holland GROWT H

High mobility and high sheet electron density in selectively doped

InAlAs/InGaAs heterostructures grown by MBE on GaAs
T. Mishima, T. Tanimoto, M. Kudoh and M. Takahama
Central Research Laboratory, Hitachi, Ltd., Kokubunji, Tokyo 185, Japan

A selectively doped InAlAs/InGaAs heterostructure, which combines both high mobility and high sheet electron density with a
high-resistivity buffer layer, is examined by MBE on GaAs using either lnAlAs or InGaAs ternary buffer layers. Lower In
compositions increase the mobility and sheet electron density of the channel by reducing misfit dislocations and enlarging the
conduction-band discontinuity between InAlAs and InGaAs. With an InAlAs buffer, the mobility reaches its maximum 7980
2/Vs and the sheet electron density is 2.8x 1012 cm2, at an In composition of 0.3. The resistivity of the InAlAs buffer was
cm
greater than 108 fl/cm2. The InGaAs buffer made a slightly higher mobility possible at the same In composition, although its
resistivity was too low (about i05 fl/cm2) for FET applications.

1. Introduction When using GaAs substrates, one is not re-

Recent papers have described the excellent
high-frequency performance of selectively doped
In
0 5A105A5/In05Ga05As FETs grown lattice-
matched on InP [1,21. Other papers have de-
scribed the crystal growth of selectively doped
In0 5A105As/1n05Ga05As heterostructures on
GaAs substrates [3—51 which results in structures
that are in many respects superior to those grown
on InP substrates; e.g., they are tougher, easier to
etch, easier to clean thermally, and cost less.
Such heterostructures have been shown to have
high mobilities despite the lattice-misfit disloca-
tions generated when InGaAs is used as a com-
positionally graded buffer layer [5]. InGaAs
buffers cannot, however, be used in FETs be-
cause their low resistivity results in leaky charac-
2 be-
teristics, a resistivity
ing required higher than 108
for FET applications. fl/cm
InAlAs buffers,
on the other hand, have a high resistivity, but
very few reports have been made on the electrical
properties of selectively doped InAlAs/InGaAs
heterostructures with InAlAs buffers, probably
due to difficulties in achieving high mobilities. In
working towards applications, we concentrated
on the use of InAlAs and a simple buffer struc-
ture with no compositional grading.
stricted to an In composition of 0.5, which is
needed for lattice-matching to InP. When using
InAlAs buffers, we found that lower In composi-
tions increased both the mobility and the sheet
electron density of the channel by reducing misfit
dislocations and enlarging the conduction-band
discontinuity between the InAlAs and the In
GaAs. InGaAs buffers, which make higher mobil-
ities possible, especially at a high In-composition
range, were also considered for comparison. We
investigated the mobility in the channel by com-
paring the lattice constants of the buffers perpen-
dicular and parallel to the surface. This compari-
son showed that the residual strain in the buffer
differed between the two materials, and that this
difference might be the cause of the different
mobility characteristics of the channel.
2. Experiments
The epitaxial layers were all grown using our
home-made MBE machine. The layer structure is
shown in fig. 1. After thermal cleaning of the
GaAs substrate at 600°C,substrate temperature
was lowered to 320—370°C to grow the buffer
layer with maintaining a smooth surface. The

0022-0248/93/$06.00 © 1993 — Elsevier Science Publishers By. All rights reserved

 T. Mishima et aL / High mobility and high sheet electron density in SD InAlAs /InGaAs HSs 771

nyGai.~As
In~AIi-~As
lOnm
lOnm
y= 0.2 P-’- 0.5
—~
U)
10
297K
‘ 5 ~

18cm’ 8
______________________________
n-InyAIi-yAs:Si l3nm Na~3.5x10 E
In,AIi.yAs 2nm ,__\ \. 3
Iny,o.2Gaos-yAs 1 3nm Growth Temp. ‘‘c 6

InyGai-yAs 460’C
InyAIi.~As
or 1.5~tm 320~
________________________ 370’C E0
= 2 0 • on In~Ga
1~As
buffer
a 1~
S.I.(I00)GaAs substrate a . on In5AI18As buffer
ci)
0 0
__________________________ 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5
Fig. 1. The selectively doped InAlAs/InGaAs heterostructure In Composition , Y
considered in this study. Fig. 3. Electrical properties of selectively doped InAlAs/In-
GaAs heterostructures versus In composition.

final 0.3 ~m of this In~Al1~Asor In~Ga1~As

layer was grown at a temperature of 460°C. On
top of this, an In~±02Ga08..~As strained channel
layer, with a higher In composition, was grown.
These and subsequent layers, from the ~
A11~As spacer to the In~Ga1~Ascap, were
grown at a rate of 1 jim/h and at an As pressure
of 1.5 x i0~ Torr. The In composition ranged
from 0.2 to 0.5, lower than that of previous stud-
ies [3—5], although the lower In composition
should be advantageous in reducing the lattice-
misfit dislocation density because of the smaller
difference in the lattice constants of the buffers
and the GaAs substrate, and should also enlarge
the conduction-band discontinuity between the
n-InAlAs and the strained InGaAs layers. Fig. 2
2.C
1.5 ~DXCenter
shows the difference between the conduction
band edge and the hybrid-orbital energy, EHO, of
the two materials as a function of the In composi-
tion [6]. The effects of strains in the InGaAs are
not compensated for in the figure, thus the actual
band edge of the InGaAs will be slightly higher.
However, this figure is accurate enough to pre-
diet that the highest sheet carrier density should
be achieve at In compositions between 0.3 and
0.4, because the energy difference between the
InGaAs band edge and the donor, or DX, level of
the n-InAlAs reaches a maximum.
The electrical properties of this structure were
evaluated using the conventional van der Pauw
method, and the lattice constants perpendicular
and parallel to the surface were measured by
X-ray diffraction from the (400) and (511) planes.
The resistivity of the buffer layers was measured
after chemical etching down to the InGaAs chan-
nel layer.

1.0 Ifly 3. Results and discussion

0
=
Ui
0.5
U o.~ Fig. 3 shows the Hall mobility and sheet car-
rier
tivelydensity
doped versus the In composition
InAlAs/InGaAs of selec-
heterostructures on
InGaAs or InAlAs buffers. The data at y 0 are =

0E reference values obtained from a conventional

0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0 selectively doped A1GaAs/In02Ga08As het-
In composition; y erostructure with the same doping density and
Fig. 2. Distance from EH0 to conduction-band edge versus In spacer layer thickness. The variation in sheet
composition. carrier density with the In composition has little
772 T. Mishima eta!. / High mobility and high sheet electron density in SD InAlAs/InGaAs HSs

dependence on the choice of buffer layer materi-

als and reaches a maximum of 2.9 x 1012 cm2 at
100
0
y 0.4, in agreement with the expectation by fig.
= 10 InyGat-yAs buffer
2. The mobilities, on the other hand, differ greatly E 10’
between the heterostructures on InGaAs and In
AlAs buffers. Those grown on InGaAs buffers
have a mobility which rises monotonically with
the In composition up to 9130 cm2/v. s, compa- 10’
rable with the best reported value [51in spite of
their simple layer structure. Those grown on In 10’
AlAs buffer, on the other hand, reach a maxi-
mum mobility of 7890 cm2/v s at y 0.3, which =

decreases with increasing in composition. This 10’

shows that the quality of heterostructures on In 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6
AlAs buffers in inferior to those built on InGaAs In composition; y
at higher In compositions. Fig. 5. Sheet resistivity versus In composition of InGaAs
In order to clarify this difference in mobility buffers.
behavior, we examined residual strain in the
buffers by measuring lattice constants parallel
and perpendicular to the surface. The results are
shown in fig. 4. InGaAs buffers produce a resid-
ual strain which is small at all In compositions,
presumably because the lattice-misfit dislocations InGaAs buffers. However, we could not find any
are concentrated at the interface with the GaAs distinctive difference in the cross-sectional TEM
substrate and because the crystalline quality re- images of the two buffers, because the observed
covers better than in InAlAs. On the other hand, dislocation density in the image depends largely
InAlAs buffers are highly strained, and the recov- on the thickness of the specimens.
cry of quality seems to be worse than for InGaAs The mobility of 7890 cm2/V. s achieved using
buffers. The dislocation density at the top of the InAlAs at y 0.3 is very high in spite of its
=

InAlAs buffer should be larger than that of the simple layer structure and, as expected, its mobil-
ity and sheet carrier density both exceed the
values at y 0.5. =

The variation of resistivity with In composition

in InGaAs buffers is shown in fig. 5. The resistivi-
ties of InAlAs buffers are not included in the
figure since they were so high (> 5 x 108 fl/cm2)
at all In compositions that our instruments simply
2 InyAli-yAs measured the resistivity of the GaAs substrate.
The resistivity of InGaAs buffers decreases at
higher In compositions, probably due to the de-
crease of the energy band-gap and an increase of
InyGat-yAs the dislocation density, since crystal defects such
as dislocations may become donors in InGaAs.
0 . The highest resistivity obtained was 1.6 X i0~
0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 fl/cm2 at y 0.2, which is still lower than the
=

In composition;y value of 1 x 108 fl/cm2 required for FET appli-

Fig. 4. Changes in lattice constant perpendicular and parallel cations. Therefore, only InAlAs buffers are suit-
to the surface, able for FET applications.
 T. Mishima et aL / High mobility and high sheet electron density in SD InAlAs /InGa~4sHSs 773

4. Summary References

A selectively doped InAlAs/InGaAs het-
erostructure, which combines high mobility and
high sheet electron density with a high-resistivity
buffer layer, was examined for In compositions
ranging from 0.2 to 0.5 and with a ternary layer of
either InAlAs or InGaAs. InGaAs buffers made
high mobilities at higher In compositions possi-
ble, but their resistivities were too low for PET
applications. However, the InAlAs buffers made
high mobilities of up to 7890 cm2/V s and high
sheet carrier densities of up to 2.8 x 1012 cm1 at
y 0.3 possible, and they also had very high
= [6]H. Hasegawa and H. Ohno, Japan. J. Appl. Phys. 25
buffer resistivities of > 5 x 108 fl/cm2.
[1] L. Nguiyen, A. Brown, M. Delaney, U. Mishra, L. Lara-
son, L Jelloian, M. Melendes, C. Hooper and M. Thomp-
son, in: Tech. Dig. IEDM 1989 (IEEE, New York, 1989) p.
105.
[2] P. Ho, MY. Kao, P.C. Chao, K.H.G. Duh, J.M. Ballingall,
S.T. Allen, A.J. Tessmar and P.M. Smith, Electron. Let-
[3] ters
G.U.27Wang,
(1991)Y.K.
325. Chen, W.J. Schaff and L.F. Eastman,
IEEE Trans. Electron Devices ED-35 (1988) 818.
[4]J.C. Harmand, T. Matsuno and K. Inoue, Japan. J. AppI.
Phys. 28 (1989) 1101.
[5]K. Inoue, J.C. Harmand and T. Matsuno, J. Crystal Growth
111 (1991) 313.
(1986) L265.