Limited impact of the sidewall effect in dependence of temperature for InGaN-based blue micro-LEDs grown on a silicon substrate

The electroluminescence (EL) properties of InGaN-based micro-LEDs grown on a silicon substrate are investigated in this Letter to reveal the dominant mechanism in dependence on different temperatures and dimensions. The invalidation of sidewall nonradiative recombination and the impact of localization-induced carrier tunneling on the external quantum efficiency (EQE) are analyzed systematically to realize high performance silicon-based micro-LEDs. Microscopic EL mapping exhibits that the localized carriers in the silicon-grown micro-LED mainly recombine in the central region of mesa. The defects in the multiple quantum wells (MQWs) grown on the silicon substrate can lead to carrier tunneling and EQE reduction at cryogenic temperatures below 200 K, which is more conspicuous for the 30 μm device with a larger inner area ratio. The low-temperature EQE evolution can be attributed to the trade-off between localization-induced tunneling and Shockley-Read-Hall (SRH) recombination.