P-type doping in wide bandgap and new classes of ultra-wide bandgap materials has long been a scientific and engineering problem. The challenges arise from the large activation energy of dopants and high densities of dislocations in materials. We report here, a significantly enhanced p-type conduction using high-quality AlGaN nanowires. For the first time, the hole concentration in Mg-doped AlGaN nanowires is quantified. The incorporation of Mg into AlGaN was verified by correlation with photoluminescence and Raman measurements. The open-circuit potential measurements further confirmed the p-type conductivity; while Mott-Schottky experiments measured a hole concentration of 1.3×1019 cm-3. These results from photoelectrochemical measurements allow us to design prototype ultraviolet (UV) light-emitting diodes (LEDs) incorporating the AlGaN quantum-disks-in-nanowire and optimized p-type AlGaN contact layer for UV-transparency. The ~335-nm LEDs exhibited a low turn-on voltage of 5 V with a series resistance of 32 Ω, due to the efficient p-type doping of the AlGaN nanowires. The bias-dependent Raman measurements further revealed the negligible self-heating of devices. This study provides an attractive solution to evaluate electrical properties of AlGaN, which is applicable to other wide bandgap nanostructures. Our results are expected to open doors to new applications for wide and ultra-wide bandgap materials.

Group-III nitride-based ultraviolet (UV) quantum-disks (Qdisks) nanowires (NWs) light-emitting diodes grown on silicon substrates offer a scalable, environment-friendly, compact, and low-cost solution for numerous applications such as solid-state lighting, spectroscopy, and biomedical. However, the internal quantum efficiency, injection efficiency, and extraction efficiency need to be further improved. The focus of this paper encompasses investigations based on structural optimization, device simulation, and device reliability. To optimize a UV-A (320-400 nm) device structure we utilize the self-assembled quantum-disk-NWs with varying quantum-disks thickness to study carrier separation in active-region and implement an improved p-contact-layer to increase output power. By simulation, we found a 100° improvement in the direct recombination rate for samples with thicker Qdisks thickness of 1.2 nm compared to the sample with 0.6 nm-thick Qdisks. Moreover, the sample with graded top Mg-doped AlGaN layer in conjunction with thin Mg-doped GaN layer shows 10° improvement in the output power compared to the samples with thicker top Mg-doped GaN absorbing contact layer. A fitting with ABC model revealed the increase in non-radiative recombination centers in the active region after a soft stress-test. This work aims to shed light on the research efforts required for furthering the UV NWs LED research for practical applications.

Consumer electronics have increasingly relied on ultra-thin glass screen due to its transparency, scalability, and cost. In particular, display technology relies on integrating light-emitting diodes with display panel as a source for backlighting. In this study, we undertook the challenge of integrating light emitters onto amorphous quartz by demonstrating the direct growth and fabrication of a III-nitride nanowire-based light-emitting diode. The proof-of-concept device exhibits a low turn-on voltage of 2.6 V, on an amorphous quartz substrate. We achieved ~ 40% transparency across the visible wavelength while maintaining electrical conductivity by employing a TiN/Ti interlayer on quartz as a translucent conducting layer. The nanowire-on-quartz LED emits a broad linewidth spectrum of light centered at true yellow color (~ 590 nm), an important wavelength bridging the green-gap in solid-state lighting technology, with significantly less strain and dislocations compared to conventional planar quantum well nitride structures. Our endeavor highlighted the feasibility of fabricating III-nitride optoelectronic device on a scalable amorphous substrate through facile growth and fabrication steps. For practical demonstration, we demonstrated tunable correlated color temperature white light, leveraging on the broadly tunable nanowire spectral characteristics across red-amber-yellow color regime.