Properties of shallow donors in ZnMgO epilayers grown by metal organic chemical vapor deposition

High quality Zn1−xMgxO epilayers have been grown by means of metal organic chemical vapor deposition technique on top of ZnO templates. The grown samples were investigated by x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and photoluminescence. The magnesium (Mg) concentration was varied between 0% and 3% in order to study the properties of shallow donors. The free and donor bound excitons could be observed simultaneously in our high quality Zn1−xMgxO epilayers in the photoluminescence spectra. The results indicate that both built-in strain and Mg-concentration influence the donor exciton binding energy. It clearly shows that the donor exciton binding energy decreases with increasing Mg-concentration and with increasing built-in strain. Furthermore, the results indicate that the donor bound exciton transition energy increases with decreasing strength of the built-in strain if the Mg-concentration is kept the same in the Zn1−xMgxO epilayers.