USE OF TERTIARY-BUTYLARSINE IN THE FABRICATION OF GAAS/ALGAAS QUANTUM-WELLS AND QUANTUM-WELL LASERS

Tertiarybutylarsine was used in the growth of GaAs and AlGaAs by metalorganic chemical vapor deposition over a range of compositions and V/III ratios. GaAs layers were obtained with both n- and p-type background carrier concentrations in the low 1014 cm-3 range. AlGaAs was grown at 20, 30, and 50% compositions, and photoluminescence of the Al 0.2Ga0.8As indicates high quality material with full width half maximum (FWHM) values of the peaks being comparable to arsine-grown AlGaAs. High quality multiple Al0.3Ga0.7As/GaAs quantum wells of various widths produced photoluminescence spectra with FWHM values comparable to arsine-grown samples. Minority-carrier lifetimes as long as 400 ns were measured for a heterostructure of 0.5 μm GaAs with Al 0.3Ga0.7As barrier layers. Graded index separate confinement heterostructure lasers were fabricated, and broad- area test results of these devices produced threshold current densities as low as 186 A/cm 2.