Journal of Crystal Growth 253 (2003) 85–88

Formation of thin GaN layer on Si (1 1 1) for fabrication of

high-temperature metal field effect transistors (MESFETs)
Seikoh Yoshida*, Jiang Li, Hironari Takehara, Takahiro Wada
Yokohama Research and Development Laboratories, The Furukawa Electric Company Limited, 2-4-3, Okano, Nishi-ku,
Yokohama 220-0073, Japan

Received 31 October 2002; accepted 10 February 2003

Communicated by C.R. Abernathy

Abstract

Thin GaN with a thickness of 0.5 mm on a Si (1 1 1) diode was grown using metal-organic chemical vapor deposition
to fabricate a low-cost metal field effect transistor (MESFET). First, a 40 nm-thick AlGaN buffer was formed on Si
(1 1 1) substrate. After that, a GaN film was grown on the buffer layer and homogeneous thin GaN without any crack
was obtained. The MESFET was fabricated using a 0.5 mm-thick GaN film on a Si substrate without a high-resistance
GaN layer. The Schottky electrode was Pt/Au and the ohmic electrode was Al/Ti/Au. As a result, 300
C operation of
the MESFET was confirmed using a thin GaN film on a Si substrate for the first time.
r 2003 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

PACS: 81.05.Ea; 78.55.Cr; 81.15.Gh; 85.30.Tv; 78.55.Cr

Keywords: A1. Crystal structure; A3. Metalorganic vapor phase epitaxy; B2. Semiconducting III–V materials; B3. MESFET devices

GaN and related materials are very effective for
high-power, high-frequency, and high-temperature
devices [1–10]. A sapphire or SiC substrate is
generally used for GaN growth. For low-cost
device fabrication, a Si substrate is very useful. Si
substrates for GaN growth have several advan-
tages compared with other substrates: they can be
obtained at low cost, and high-quality Si wafers
with a large diameter can be easily obtained.
However, a high-quality very thin GaN film on a
Si substrate is required for low-cost mass produc-
*Corresponding author. Tel.: +81-45-311-1218; fax: +81-
45-316-6374.
E-mail address: seikoh@yokoken.furukawa.co.jp
(S. Yoshida).
tion. The growth of GaN on Si is very difficult due
to the difference in lattice constant and the
thermal-expansion coefficient. Recently, good-
quality GaN on a Si substrate has been reported
[11–16]. An AlGaN/GaN heterojunction field
effect transistor (HFET) on a Si substrate has
been reported. However, it has not yet been
reported that by using a thin film of GaN below
1 mm in thickness, including high-resistance layers,
electronic devices such as FETs or Schottky
barrier diodes (SBDs) can be fabricated. Our
purpose is to fabricate electronic devices using
very thin GaN and related materials on a Si
substrate in order to fabricate low-cost devices. In
this paper, we report that by using an AlGaN
buffer, crack-free GaN was obtained on a Si (1 1 1)

0022-0248/03/$ - see front matter r 2003 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/S0022-0248(03)01020-0
86 S. Yoshida et al. / Journal of Crystal Growth 253 (2003) 85–88
substrate, and that a metal field effect transistor
(MESFET) with a breakdown voltage of over
100 V was obtained using a 0.5 mm-thick GaN film
for the first time.
We tried to grow crack-free GaN without
cracking on a 2-in p-type Si (1 1 1) substrate using
metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD)
in order to fabricate a Schottky diode. Trime-
thylgallium (TMG), trimethylaluminium (TMA),
and ammonia (NH3) were used for source
gases. A thin AlGaN buffer was used for GaN
growth.
We first investigated the optimum formation
temperature for an AlGaN buffer on a p-type Si
(1 1 1) substrate. The Al composition of Alx-
Ga1xN buffer was between 0.05 and 0.2 and the
thickness of the AlxGa1xN was 40 nm. After that,
GaN was grown at 1030
C. When the buffer-
formation temperatures were above 830
C, the
GaN layer became islanded and cracks were
generated. Fig. 1 shows a cross-section transmis-
sion electron microscope (TEM) image of GaN/
AlGaN/Si (1 1 1). This image shows that a buffer
layer was island-like and was composed of both
large and small grains. The small grains were
composed of inversion or micro-crystal domains.
The GaN was preferentially grown on the large
buffer domain and the grown GaN with a large
grain size had a mesa shape with a smooth surface.
When the buffer-formation temperatures were
800–830
C, an AlGaN buffer layer with a smooth
surface was obtained. As a result, a homogeneous
0.5 mm-thick GaN without any crack was obtained
Fig. 1. Cross-sectional TEM image of GaN/Si (1 1 1) on an
AlGaN buffer which was grown at a temperature of 850
C.
at 1030
C. Fig. 2 also shows a cross-sectional
TEM image of GaN/AlGaN/Si (1 1 1). A smooth
surface without cracking of the GaN was ob-
tained. Furthermore, when the formation tem-
peratures of a buffer layer were below 800
C, we
observed that the cross-sectional TEM image of
GaN/AlGaN/Si (1 1 1) was island-like; the buffer
layer was also islanded, resulting in the occurrence
of islanding of the GaN as well. Therefore, the
optimum buffer formation temperature for sup-
pressing the cracking of GaN was 800–830
C.
We next investigated the Al composition depen-
dence of the AlxGa1xN buffer at a constant
formation temperature (830
C). When the Al
composition of the AlxGa1xN buffer was above
0.3, the surface morphology of the thick GaN
grown on top was rough. It is conjectured that the
AlGaN buffer layer had many grains, including
Si
100nm
Fig. 2. Cross-sectional TEM image of GaN/Si (1 1 1) on an
AlGaN buffer grown at temperatures 800–830
C.
77K
PL intensity (A.U.)
340 380 420 460 500 540 580 620 660 700
Wavelength (nm)
Fig. 3. PL spectrum of GaN/Si (1 1 1) at 77 K.
 S. Yoshida et al. / Journal of Crystal Growth 253 (2003) 85–88 87

polycrystalline grains, which make it difficult to AlxGa1xN buffer layer needed to obtain a
grow GaN on the surface. When a GaN (x ¼ 0) smooth surface in the thick GaN grown on top
buffer was used for GaN growth, the thick GaN was in the range x ¼ 0:0520:2: We thus confirmed
was rough and cracks were generated. Therefore, the optimum growth condition of AlxGa1xN
in this case a GaN buffer was not suitable. It buffer for the formation of a thin homogeneous
was confirmed that the Al composition of the GaN layer on a Si (1 1 1) substrate.
A photoluminescence (PL) measurement of the
0.5 mm-thick GaN/Si (1 1 1) was carried out at
77 K, as shown in Fig. 3. A sharp GaN band edge
emission as well as a broad and weak yellow
luminescence was observed. We next investigated
the electrical properties. The Hall mobility of the
0.5 mm-thick GaN was measured at room tem-
perature. The carrier concentration of the un-
doped GaN was 8  1016 cm3 and the Hall
mobility was 260 cm2/V s.
We directly fabricated a MESFET using a thin
Si-doped (Si: 2  1017 cm3) GaN (500 nm)/Al-
GaN buffer (40 nm) on a p-type Si (1 1 1) substrate
Fig. 4. Schematic structure of a MESFET using a thin GaN without using a highly resistive GaN layer.
film on a p-type Si substrate without a highly resistive GaN Etching of the GaN layer was carried out by a
layer. dry-etching technique using an electron cyclotron

25 7
6
20
5
Ids (mA/mm)
Ids (mA/mm)

15 4

10 3
2
5
1
0 0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 0 5 10 15 20 25 30
(a) Vds (V) (b) Vds (V)

7
6
Ids (mA/mm)

5
4
3
2
1
0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30
(c) Vds (V)
Fig. 5. Current–voltage characteristics of a MESFET using a thin GaN film on a Si substrate at (a) room temperature, (b) 200
C, (c)
300
C. The gate bias (Vgs ) was changed from +2 to 10 V in steps of 2 V.
88 S. Yoshida et al. / Journal of Crystal Growth 253 (2003) 85–88
resonance (ECR) plasma to make the mesa. The
etching gas was a mixture of CH4 (5 sccm), Ar
(7 sccm) and H2 (15 sccm). The etching rate of the
GaN layers was 14 nm/min. The etch depth was
600 nm. The gate length and width were 2 and
100 mm, respectively. The distance between the
source and drain was 10 mm. A schematic of the
structure of the MESFET is shown in Fig. 4. In
this case, a contact layer was not formed for the
source and drain electrodes. The ohmic electrode
material was Al/Ti/Au and the Schottky electrode
material was Pt/Au. The Schottky breakdown
voltage of the gate and source was over 100 V.
Fig. 5 shows the current–voltage (I2V ) behavior
of a MESFET at room temperature, 200
C, and
300
C. The device was operational at 300
C,
although the leakage current was slightly in-
creased. We believe that the increase in the leakage
current at the pinch-off voltage depends on the
crystal quality of the interface of the GaN and
AlGaN buffer layer. The I2V behavior was stable
at 300
C for over 100 h. Also, when the FET was
cooled down to room temperature, the I2V curve
was recovered again, as shown in Fig. 5(a). The
transconductance (gm ) was about 5 mS/mm, and
can be expected to be improved by forming a
contact layer and AlGaN/GaN heterojunction
with a two-dimensional electron gas. High-tem-
perature operation of the MESFET using a thin
GaN with a thickness of 500 nm on Si substrate
was thus demonstrated.
In summary, a high-quality homogeneous GaN
film with a high quality on a Si (1 1 1) substrate
was obtained using an AlGaN high-temperature
buffer. A MESFET using this thin GaN film on a
Si (1 1 1) substrate was fabricated. High-tempera-
ture operation of the MESFET at 300
C was
demonstrated using a 500 nm-thick GaN/Si sub-
strate without a thick highly resistive GaN layer. A
breakdown voltage of over 100 V was obtained for
the first time. We thus demonstrated that a GaN
film with a thickness below 1 mm on a Si substrate
is very useful for electronic devices.
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