APPLIED PHYSICS LETTERS 88, 112111 共2006兲

Ultrafast recombination in Si-doped InN

Ricardo Ascázubi and Ingrid Wilkea兲
Department of Physics, Applied Physics and Astronomy, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy,
New York 12180
Shinho Cho
Department of Photonics, Silla University, Busan, Republic of Korea
Hai Lu and William J. Schaff
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853
共Received 12 December 2005; accepted 17 February 2006; published online 16 March 2006兲
We report femtosecond near-infrared transient photoreflection measurements of native n-type
indium nitride and silicon-doped indium nitride thin films. The overall time dependence of the
ultrafast reflectivity transient is characterized by the different time scales of carrier cooling and
carrier recombination. Experimental analysis demonstrates nonradiative recombination in the
picosecond and subpicosecond range as the dominant recombination mechanism at room
temperature even at very high carrier concentrations. Silicon-doped InN films exhibit carrier
lifetimes as short as 680 fs. © 2006 American Institute of Physics. 关DOI: 10.1063/1.2185407兴

InN is regarded as an essential component of the group
III-nitride semiconductor system. Recent progress towards
the growth of high quality InN thin films has led to the
revision of the fundamental band gap of InN1 from 2.0 to
0.69 eV. This discovery currently stimulates research on the
fundamental optical and electronic properties of InN and the
development of applications in many optoelectronic devices
and systems. It has been demonstrated2 that InN is an effi-
cient emitter of broadband THz radiation for time-domain
THz sensing and imaging. In1−xGaxN also has a strong po-
tential for the fabrication of efficient solar cells.3 Addition-
ally, InN is of interest for photovoltaic devices in space ap-
plications, because it exhibits a very high radiation
resistance.3 In order to materialize the potential of InN for
device applications the understanding of carrier dynamics, in
particular of phonon scattering and carrier recombination, is
crucial.
Due to the polar character of InN, optical phonons are
expected to play a significant role in the carrier scattering
process. Chen et al.4 studied hot carrier relaxation in InN by
time-resolved photoluminescence measurements. They ob-
served that hot carriers are fully relaxed after 10 ps. High
speed I-V characterization5 has shown, through power bal-
ance considerations, that the LO-phonon scattering time in
InN should be around 200 fs, while Raman spectroscopy6
indicates a LO-phonon lifetime of 0.7– 1.3 ps through uncer-
tainty principle considerations. These values of the LO-
phonon scattering time are far from those predicted by
theory,7 which range from 16 to 31 fs.
Furthermore, it has been reported8 that carrier recombi-
nation at 20 K is dominated by radiative recombination with
nanosecond carrier lifetimes. In contrast, recombination at
room temperature is dominated by nonradiative recombina-
tion. It has also been observed that the nonradiative recom-
bination lifetime depends inversely on the carrier concentra-
tion and assumes ⬃50 ps at n ⬇ 1019 cm−3.8 Localized
nonradiative recombination centers are presumed to be re-
sponsible for carrier trapping.
a兲
Electronic mail: wilkei@rpi.edu
In this letter we present a study of carrier dynamics in
InN thin films by femtosecond time-resolved reflectivity
measurements. Our InN thin films are grown9 by molecular
beam epitaxy 共MBE兲 on c-plane sapphire with AlN nucle-
ation layers and GaN buffer layers. Unintentionally doped
InN films used in this work have a sheet carrier concentration
ranging from 7 ⫻ 1017 to 1 ⫻ 1019 cm−3 and silicon-doped
InN films have a carrier concentration ranging from
2 ⫻ 1019 to 4 ⫻ 1020 cm−3. The film thickness ranges from
150 nm to 4.6 ␮m and the mobility of these samples ranges
from 80 to 1673 cm2 / V s. Transient photoreflection has been
investigated with an optical pump-probe arrangement. The
InN samples are excited with 130 fs Ti: S laser pulses with a
wavelength centered at 800 nm. The maximum excitation la-
ser power is 400 mW and the laser pulse repetition rate is
82 MHz. The pump and probe beams are focused by a lens
共f = 200 mm兲 on the InN sample. A 10 ␮m pinhole was used
to achieve spatial overlap of the pump and probe beams and
to estimate the focal spot size. The estimated optically gen-
erated carrier density is 1.4⫻ 1020 cm−3. All samples have
been studied at room temperature.
The polarization of the pump beam is parallel to the
plane of incidence and perpendicular to the probe beam po-
larization. In order to study the dependence of the photore-
flection signal with optical pump power a variable neutral
density filter was used. Modulation and lock-in detection has
been used to observe reflectivity variations 共⌬R / R兲 of 10−5.
The transient reflectivity of an optically excited semi-
conductor is explained by a variation of the complex refrac-
tive index through several effects like the absorption change
due to band filling 共BF兲, band-gap renormalization 共BGR兲,
free carrier absorption, and carrier recombination. Our inter-
pretation of the temporal evolution of the transient reflectiv-
ity of InN follows the calculations of band-gap renormaliza-
tion and band filling as outlined.10 In our picture the carriers
acquire a hot, thermalized energy distribution during excita-
tion itself and then cool via phonon emission. This assump-
tion is based on the fact that we perform our measurements
at high excitation densities that favor quick thermalization of
the hot carriers via carrier-carrier scattering and the experi-

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 112111-2 Ascázubi et al.
FIG. 1. Recorded reflectivity transient for a silicon-doped InN film. 共n
= 1020 cm−3, ⌬nopt = 1.4⫻ 1020 cm−3.兲 The reflectivity decay is fitted by a
single exponential 关exp共−t / ␶兲兴 with ␶ = 1.19 ps. This process is attributed to
nonradiative defect-related recombination. The inset shows the reflectivity
transient for an undoped InN film 共n = 7 ⫻ 1018 cm−3, ⌬nopt = 1.4
⫻ 1020 cm−3兲. Two processes are observed therein: carrier cooling within the
first 2 – 3 ps and nonradiative recombination at later times.
mental observation that InN exhibits rather long LO-phonon
scattering times 共⬃200 fs兲.5 Photoreflection transients of un-
intentionally doped InN and InN: Si are shown in Fig. 1. For
our samples, the temporal evolution of the reflectivity signal
is characterized by an initial fast decrease, followed by a
quick rise and a second much slower decay of the reflectiv-
ity. In the Fig. 1 inset, the reflectivity change within the first
2 – 3 ps of our measurements reflects the carrier cooling. The
temporal shape of the reflectivity is dominated by the inter-
play of band-gap renormalization and band filling. At short
delays and high carrier temperature band filling is far from
saturation and the BGR effect, which is strong in InN,11
dominates the reflectivity signal. This results in a decrease in
reflectivity. As carriers cool and relax towards the band edge
the change in absorption due to BF gets larger than the
change due to BGR. This leads to an increase of the reflec-
tivity. The subsequently observed slow decay of the reflec-
tivity is attributed to carrier trapping and recombination. The
carrier recombination lifetime was obtained from these mea-
surements by fitting a single exponential to the reflectivity
decay. The carrier lifetimes in dependence of carrier concen-
trations are illustrated in Fig. 2. They range from 64 ps for a
carrier concentration of n = 7 ⫻ 1017 cm−3 to a carrier lifetime
of 680 fs at n = 4 ⫻ 1020 cm−3. The overall temporal shape of
the reflectivity transient is characterized by the different time
scales of carrier cooling and carrier recombination. For rela-
tively long carrier lifetimes the carrier cooling effect is
clearly visible in the reflectivity transient as indicated by the
initial reflectivity decrease and the broad reflectivity peak
共Fig. 1, inset兲. For short carrier lifetimes the broad reflectiv-
ity peak vanishes 共Fig. 1兲. Although we are not able to de-
duce quantitatively the LO-phonon scattering rate from these
measurements, our observation of the overall temporal shape
of the reflectivity transient supports that the LO-phonon scat-
tering time in InN is significantly longer than the 31 fs pre-
dicted by theory.
Next, we discuss the carrier lifetime. Our results demon-
strate that silicon-doped InN samples have recombination
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Appl. Phys. Lett. 88, 112111 共2006兲
FIG. 2. Recombination lifetimes vs carrier concentration. Silicon-doped InN
samples show recombination lifetimes lower by an order of magnitude than
the undoped counterparts. The carrier concentration was determined by dc
Hall measurements.
lifetimes by an order of magnitude lower than the uninten-
tionally doped InN samples. The carrier lifetime exhibits an
inverse dependence on the carrier concentration for carrier
concentrations up to 4 ⫻ 1020 cm−3. The reduction of the re-
combination lifetime in silicon-doped InN compared to un-
doped InN suggests that silicon impurities may act as ul-
trafast trapping and recombination centers in InN. Our
observation of an inverse relationship between carrier life-
time and carrier concentration in InN agree with previous
time-resolved differential transmission measurements of un-
doped InN.12 However, our time-resolved reflectivity mea-
surements result in carrier lifetimes that are shorter by an
order of magnitude. It is noteworthy that reflection experi-
ments probe the InN surface up to the optical penetration
depth 共200 nm at 800 nm wavelength1兲 as opposed to trans-
mission experiments where the bulk and the surface are
probed. InN exhibits a high surface charge accumulation
arising from surface defects. This high defect density near
the surface may be responsible for the difference between
reflection and transmission carrier lifetimes.
In order to investigate the nature of the carrier recombi-
nation process reflectivity transients have been measured for
various excitation fluences. The observed peak signal ampli-
tude versus fluence as well as the carrier lifetime versus flu-
ence are shown in Fig. 3. The reflectivity exhibits a linear
dependence on fluence. This is in agreement with intraband
free carrier absorption. According to the Shockley-Read-Hall
theory12 the carrier lifetime ␶ is expected to be independent
of the total carrier density n + ⌬n if nonradiative recombina-
tion is the dominant mechanism among nonradiative
关␶nr = 1 / 共Ndef␴defv兲, radiative 共␶rad = Brad / 共n + ⌬n兲兴 and Auger
recombination 关tA = CAuger / 共n + ⌬n兲2兴:
1 1 n + ⌬n 共n + ⌬n兲2
= + + . 共1兲
␶ ␶nr Brad CAuger
The carrier lifetime ␶ observed in our experiments is
independent of fluence within the error of our measurements.
Therefore, we conclude that nonradiative carrier recombina-
tion is the dominant recombination mechanism for carrier
densities up to n ⬇ 1020 cm−3 at room temperature. Radiative
 112111-3 Ascázubi et al.
FIG. 3. The reflectivity change depends linearly on fluence, as expected
from intraband carrier absorption. The carrier lifetime does not depend on
the fluence, as expected for nonradiative recombination.
recombination and Auger recombination do not appear to
contribute significantly to carrier recombination even at such
high carrier densities. These observations are in agreement
with previous experiments8,12 that reported nonradiative re-
combination being the dominant recombination mechanism
in InN with carrier densities up to n ⬇ 1019 cm−3.
Subpicosecond recombination lifetimes observed in our
experiments make InN an interesting candidate for possible
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Appl. Phys. Lett. 88, 112111 共2006兲
ultrafast application such as an Auston switch.13 InN is espe-
cially attractive for those applications because of the absence
of low side valleys14 in this material and because the band
gap of InN is lower than that of other ultrafast photoconduc-
tive materials such as LT-GaAs. This may enable the use of
InN THz detectors with solid-state 1.55 ␮m fiber lasers in
portable THz spectroscopy systems.
This material is based upon work supported by the
National Science Foundation under Grant No. 0333314.
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