Low-temperature growth of AlN and GaN by metal organic vapor phase epitaxy for polarization engineered water splitting photocathode

Crystal properties of low-temperature grown AlN (LT-AlN) combined with low temperature GaN (LT-GaN) grown by metal organic vapor phase epitaxy (MOVPE) were investigated to obtain a high quality GaN/AlN/GaN structure with a few-nm-thick AlN layer. LT-AlN suppresses unintentional Ga incorporation and can be pseudomorphically grown on GaN with a relatively smooth surface morphology. The lattice of LT-AlN coherent to GaN, however, was found to relax after reactor conditions were changed to grow the subsequent GaN layer at higher temperature. The top GaN layer grown on the relaxed LT-AlN, thus, exhibited a rough surface morphology and a threading dislocation density (TDD) higher than 109cm−2 estimated from an X-ray diffraction measurement. An LT-GaN capping layer was found to be highly effective for avoiding such lattice relaxation of LT-AlN. The combination of LT-AlN and LT-GaN enables us to obtain a GaN/AlN/GaN junction with high Al content, a low TDD, and abrupt interfaces. As a result, introducing an LT-GaN layer improved the photoelectrochemical (PEC) property of a polarization engineered un-doped GaN/AlN/n-type GaN (u-GaN/AlN/n-GaN) photocathode for water splitting. •AlN coherently grown on GaN at 800°C relaxes when growth conditions are changed.•The lattice relaxation can be avoided by introducing a GaN capping layer.•Property of u-GaN/AlN/n-GaN photoelectrode was enhanced by using the capping layer.