Polarization-balanced design of heterostructures: Application to AlN/GaN double-barrier structures

Journal article, 2011

Inversion and depletion regions generally form at the interfaces between doped leads ( cladding layers) and the active region of polar heterostructures like AlN/GaN and other nitride compounds. The band bending in the depletion region sets up a barrier that may seriously impede perpendicular electronic transport. This may ruin the performance of devices such as quantum-cascade lasers and resonant-tunneling diodes. Here we introduce the concepts of polarization balance and polarization-balanced designs: A structure is polarization balanced when the applied bias match the voltage drop arising from spontaneous and piezeolectric fields. Devices designed to operate at this bias have polarization-balanced designs. These concepts offer a systematic approach to avoid the formation of depletion regions. As a test case, we consider the design of AlN/GaN double-barrier structures with Al((x) over tilde)Ga(1-(x) over tilde)N leads. To guide our efforts, we derive a simple relation between the intrinsic voltage drop arising from polar effects, average alloy composition of the active region, and the alloy concentration of the leads. Polarization-balanced designs secure good filling of the ground state for unbiased structures, while for biased structures with efficient emptying of the active region they remove the depletion barriers.