Journal of ELECTRONIC MATERIALS, Vol. 40, No.

12, 2011
DOI: 10.1007/s11664-011-1791-x
Ó 2011 TMS

Elevated-Temperature Annealing Effects on AlGaN/GaN

Heterostructures

BENEDICT OFUONYE,1 JAESUN LEE,1 MINJUN YAN,1

QHALID FAREED,2 IFTIKHAR AHMAD,2 ASIF KHAN,2
and ILESANMI ADESIDA1,3

1.—Micro and Nanotechnology Laboratory, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering,

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801, USA. 2.—Department of Electrical
and Computer Engineering, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC 29208, USA. 3.—e-mail:
iadesida@illinois.edu

The effect of high-temperature annealing of undoped AlGaN/GaN hetero-

structures on different substrates was systematically studied between 1100°C
and 1230°C. An AlN spacer layer was found to add stability to structures on
sapphire substrates. AlGaN/GaN heterostructures on SiC substrates demon-
strated excellent robustness for the temperature range studied, maintaining
their mobility, sheet resistance, and sheet concentration values, even after
annealing. A silicon nitride, SiNx, capping layer was found to assist in mini-
mizing surface roughness during annealing and maintaining the electrical
characteristics of the heterostructures. AlGaN/GaN heterostructures on SiC
substrates showed a 20% decrease in mobility for uncapped samples compared
with SiNx-capped samples.

Key words: Temperature annealing, roughness, mobility, sheet resistance

INTRODUCTION also showed significant sheet resistance improve-

ment at annealing temperatures higher than
Heterostructures for AlGaN/GaN high-electron-
1250°C.4 Silicon-implanted AlGaN demonstrated
mobility transistors (HEMTs) are commonly grown
excellent activation at annealing temperatures as
using molecular-beam epitaxy (MBE) at around
high as 1350°C.5–7 On the negative side, MOCVD-
800°C or by metalorganic chemical vapor deposition
and MBE-grown AlGaN on sapphire samples were
(MOCVD) at around 1000°C to 1150°C. The AlGaN
found to degrade in structure when annealed in air
barrier layer of the HEMT structure is usually
at 1100°C or at 1200°C in nitrogen.8 AlGaN with
unintentionally doped, thereby having very low
high aluminum mole fraction of 0.72 was found to
doping level. However, it is desirable to have high
decompose upon annealing at 1150°C in the pres-
doping in the ohmic contact areas to enable reali-
ence of small amounts of oxygen.9
zation of low contact resistances. Silicon ion
Annealing of implanted AlGaN/GaN HEMTs at
implantation is one of the viable methods for
such high temperatures may impact the integrity
increasing the dopant concentrations in GaN and
(structure and mobility) of the two-dimensional
AlGaN semiconductors.1–7 However, activation of
electron gas (2-DEG). Previous studies on the
implanted dopants requires high-temperature
robustness of the 2-DEG of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs
treatment, higher than the growth temperatures for
under thermal treatments have been performed at
dopant activation. MBE-grown GaN on sapphire
temperatures ranging from 500°C to 900°C in
with Si implantation at dose of 5 9 1015 cm 2
air.10–12 Long-time annealing resulted in slight
showed over 100% increase in mobility after
oxidation and irreversible lattice relaxation in the
annealed at temperatures between 1050°C and
AlGaN due to oxygen incorporation at the surface,
1350°C.1 Implanted MOCVD-grown GaN materials
resulting in a decrease in the 2-DEG mobility.10
(Received March 18, 2011; accepted September 27, 2011; Roccaforte et al. found that annealing HEMT layers
published online October 15, 2011) in air at 500°C resulted in a decrease of the 2-DEG

2344
Elevated-Temperature Annealing Effects on AlGaN/GaN Heterostructures 2345

sheet carrier density and mobility.11 It has also been RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
reported that the electron affinity of annealed
The annealing temperature dependence of the
AlGaN/GaN HEMT structures steadily decreases
sheet concentration, sheet resistance, and mobility
with annealing temperature due to greater charge
of the samples capped with 30-nm SiNx are shown in
confinement.13 Annealing studies at 500°C for three
Figs. 1–3. Dark squares indicate sheet resistance,
MOCVD-grown HEMT structures on sapphire sub-
blue stars indicate sheet charge concentration, and
strates revealed that both the 2-DEG density and
red circles indicate mobility. Figure 1 shows that
mobility decreased due to strain relaxation in the
there is substantial degradation of the AlGaN/GaN
AlGaN layer.14 A 2-nm GaN capping layer was
on sapphire substrate when annealed at elevated
found to stabilize the 2-DEG for up to 75 h of ther-
temperatures. A mobility value of 1220 cm2/V-s for
mal treatment at 500°C. Thermal stability study of
the unannealed sample was reduced to 660 cm2/V-s
AlGaN/GaN heterostructures up to 800°C showed
after annealing at 1230°C for 3 min, showing up to
increases in the sheet resistance.15
40% degradation. The sheet resistance also
For self-aligned AlGaN/GaN HEMTs, ion
increased from 402 X/sq. in the unannealed sample
implantation may be needed to realize low ohmic
to 862 X/sq. The sheet charge concentration chan-
contact resistances for high-speed device perfor-
ged from 1.27 9 1013 cm 3 to 1.10 9 1013 cm 3,
mance. This means that the heterostructures will be
representing a decrease of 13%.
exposed to temperatures higher than 800°C. It is
The AlGaN/AlN/GaN heterostructure on sapphire
therefore imperative to study the thermal stability
showed much higher mobility performance both
of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs at temperatures that are
before and after thermal annealing compared with
higher than the growth temperatures. The HEMT
AlGaN/GaN layer on sapphire substrate, as shown
layers may need to be carefully engineered to
in Fig. 2. It should be noted that the sample had a
ensure that their properties do not degrade after
thinner AlGaN barrier layer (20 nm) along with an
thermal annealing at these elevated temperatures.
Herein, we present a study on the thermal treat-
ment of different AlGaN/GaN HEMT structures at
temperatures above 1150°C. The effect of capping
the samples with silicon nitride layers is also pre-
sented.

EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURES
The three different AlGaN/GaN HEMT structures
used in this work were all grown using MOCVD on
sapphire and SiC substrates. The HEMT layers were
as follows: (1) AlGaN(30 nm)/GaN(1.7 lm) on sap-
phire substrate, (2) AlGaN(20 nm)/AlN(1 nm)/
GaN(1 lm) on sapphire substrate, and (3)
GaN(2 nm)/AlGaN(18 nm)/AlN(1 nm)/GaN(1 lm) on
SiC substrate. The AlGaN layer in the heterostruc-
tures had 25% Al mole fraction. Hall samples that Fig. 1. Mobility, sheet resistance, and sheet concentration for
were 7 mm 9 7 mm in dimension were prepared for AlGaN/GaN on sapphire after elevated-temperature annealing.
van der Pauw Hall measurements.16,17 The samples
were annealed at temperatures ranging from 1150°C
to 1230°C for 3 min in an MOCVD chamber under an
overpressure of NH3/N2 ambient. The flow rate of
NH3 was 3.5 slm and that of N2 was 4.5 slm. The
pressures were 150 Torr for GaN and 76 Torr for
AlGaN. Before annealing, the samples were capped
with 30-nm-thick plasma-enhanced chemical-vapor-
deposited (PECVD) SiNx. The SiNx cap was removed
using hydrofluoric acid (HF) after annealing. Mo/Al/
Mo/Au metallizations were then patterned and
deposited at the four corners of the van der Pauw
samples and annealed at 575°C to form ohmic con-
tacts. The sheet resistance, sheet concentration, and
mobility of the samples were then measured using an
Accent HP5500PC Hall-effect measurement system.
The roughness of the samples before and after
annealing was measured using a Digital Instruments Fig. 2. Mobility, sheet resistance, and sheet concentration for
3000 atomic force microscopy (AFM) system. AlGaN/AlN/GaN on sapphire after elevated-temperature annealing.
2346 Ofuonye, Lee, Yan, Fareed, Ahmad, Khan, and Adesida

AlN (1 nm) spacer layer. Its mobility value was measured on the unannealed samples. Capped
around 1600 cm2/V-s, compared with 1220 cm2/V-s samples had approximately the same roughness as
for the sample which had a thicker AlGaN barrier the unannealed samples, showing that the impact of
layer (30 nm) and no AlN spacer layer. It has been HF treatment on the samples was minimal. How-
observed that a thin AlN layer provides greater ever, the slightly higher value of roughness was
charge confinement in AlGaN/GaN structures with probably due to removal of native oxides from the
resulting higher 2-DEG mobility.18 Incorporation of surface. RMS surface roughness of 1.3 nm was
the thinner barrier layer with the AlN spacer layer observed after a 3-min anneal at 1230°C for the
gave some stability to the 2-DEG after thermal layer without a SiNx cap, representing over 70%
annealing at 1230°C. Only a slight drop of 10% in degradation in surface roughness. Figure 4 shows
mobility was observed in the sample that was an- AFM images of 1 lm 9 1 lm areas of the various
nealed at 1230°C compared with the unannealed samples listed in Table I at depth scale of 10 nm.
sample. The sheet resistance remained fairly con- The increased roughness of the uncapped samples
stant and the sheet concentration increased slightly as seen in Fig. 4e, f could be attributed to nitrogen
with annealing temperature. vacancies that were created on the surface due to
The Hall measurement data for the samples breaking of Ga–N bonds at the surface despite the
grown on SiC substrate with an AlN (1 nm) spacer NH3/N2 ambient.
layer, 2-nm GaN cap, and 18-nm AlGaN barrier It was observed that there was a correlation
layer are shown in Fig. 3. No observable degrada- between the magnitude of the roughness and the
tion in the 2-DEG properties after annealing at mobility degradation. Mobility of 1180 cm2/V-s was
elevated temperatures was exhibited. The small measured for the sample with a SiNx cap, compared
variance in the values was probably due to wafer with mobility of 903 cm2/V-s for the sample without
nonuniformity, so the various samples used would the SiNx cap. Annealing at 1230°C for 3 min
have slightly different values of sheet resistance,
concentration, and mobility. Mobility measure-
ments of annealed ion-implanted AlGaN/GaN
HEMTs on SiC without both GaN cap and AlN
spacer layer showed robustness in mobility values
up to 1200°C activation temperature.19 This implies
that, even without the GaN cap or AlN spacer layer,
AlGaN/GaN structures on SiC substrates are rela-
tively stable under elevated thermal annealing.
The layer of GaN(2 nm)/AlGaN(18 nm)/AlN
(1 nm)/GaN(1 lm) on SiC substrate was used to
evaluate the impact of a 30-nm-thick SiNx cap on
the surface roughness of the annealed samples at
1230°C, instead of the layer of the AlGaN/GaN
HEMT structures on SiC substrates due to the
thermal stability issues. As mentioned previously,
the nitride film was removed in HF after annealing.
Root-mean-square (RMS) roughness of 0.25 nm was

Fig. 3. Mobility, sheet resistance, and sheet concentration for GaN/ Fig. 4. Two-dimensional atomic force micrographs of 1 lm by 1 lm
AlGaN/AlN/GaN on SiC after elevated-temperature annealing. surface areas of samples a–f listed in Table I.
Elevated-Temperature Annealing Effects on AlGaN/GaN Heterostructures
Table I. Measured RMS roughness of annealed samples
Sample Heat Treatment
a No anneal
b No anneal/20 min HF dip
c 1230°C/3 min
d 1230°C/10 min
e 1230°C/3 min
f 1230°C/10 min
reduced the mobility values by almost 20% both
with and without the SiNx cap. Roughness increases
scattering events20 and affects mobility. High-tem-
perature treatment would change the interfacial
smoothness, resulting in more scattering along the
path of the 2-DEG. This could explain the mobility
degradation in the samples without the SiNx cap.
Annealing without a SiNx cap has also been shown
to degrade the Schottky diode ideality of n-GaN
when the n-GaN was annealed between 1150°C and
1200°C prior to the formation of the Schottky con-
tacts.21 It is therefore necessary to cap AlGaN/GaN
layers during high-temperature annealing to pre-
serve their structural and electrical properties.
CONCLUSIONS
Systematic study of the effects of annealing at
elevated temperatures on three different AlGaN/
GaN HEMT structures with various layer thick-
nesses and structures was carried out. AlGaN/GaN
heterostructures grown on SiC substrates were
found to have the best thermal stability at high
temperatures up to 1230°C. Structures on sapphire
substrates with thicker AlGaN barrier layers per-
formed poorly after being annealed at elevated
temperatures. Severe degradations in mobility and
sheet resistance were observed. Incorporation of a
1-nm AlN spacer layer with a thinner AlGaN bar-
rier layer of about 20 nm ensured the maintenance
of the 2-DEG integrity after high-temperature
annealing.
Also, SiNx cap layers were critical to maintaining
the surface morphology of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs
during high-temperature annealing. Samples with-
out a SiNx cap were found to have increased surface
roughness up to five times the value of the unan-
nealed samples and up to 20% degradation in
mobility in comparison with capped samples. For
practical fabrication of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs, using
AlGaN/GaN heterostructures grown on SiC with an
AlN spacer layer along with a SiNx cap layer could
provide better processing stability and latitude for
ion-implanted HEMTs with high-temperature
annealing.
2347
RMS Roughness of 1 lm
30-nm SiN Cap 3 1 lm Area (nm)
– 0.25
– 0.43
Yes 0.24
Yes 0.37
No 1.3
No 1.15
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This work was supported by ONR Grant No.
N00014-05-1-0449.
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