We demonstrated AlGaN-based deep ultraviolet light-emitting diodes (DUV LEDs) with periodic air-voids-incorporated nanoscale patterns enabled by nanosphere lithography and epitaxial lateral overgrowth (ELO) on a 4-in. sapphire substrate. The nanoscale ELO improved the crystal quality of overgrown epitaxial layers at a relatively low growth temperature of 1050 °C and at small coalescence thickness less than 2 μm. The light output power of the DUV LED was enhanced significantly by 67% at an injection current of 20 mA. We attribute such a remarkable enhancement to the formation of embedded periodic air voids which cause simultaneous improvements in the crystal quality of epitaxial layers by ELO and light extraction efficiency enabled by breaking the predominant in-plane guided propagation of DUV photons.

The temperature-dependent external quantum efficiencies (EQEs) were investigated for a 620 nm AlGaInP red light-emitting diodes (LEDs), a 450 nm GaInN blue LED, and a 285 nm AlGaN deep-ultraviolet (DUV) LED. We observed distinct differences in the variation of the EQE with temperature and current density for the three types of LEDs. Whereas the EQE of the AlGaInP red LED increases as temperature decreases below room temperature, the EQEs of GaInN blue and AlGaN DUV LEDs decrease for the same change in temperature in a low-current density regime. The free carrier concentration, as determined from the dopant ionization energy, shows a strong material-system-specific dependence, leading to different degrees of asymmetry in carrier concentration for the three types of LEDs. We attribute the EQE variation of the red, blue, and DUV LEDs to the different degrees of asymmetry in carrier concentration, which can be exacerbated at cryogenic temperatures. As for the EQE variation with temperature in a high-current density regime, the efficiency droop for the AlGaInP red and GaInN blue LEDs becomes more apparent as temperature decreases, due to the deterioration of the asymmetry in carrier concentration. However, the EQE of the AlGaN DUV LED initially decreases, then reaches an EQE minimum point, and then increases again due to the field-ionization of acceptors by the Poole-Frenkel effect. The results elucidate that carrier transport phenomena allow for the understanding of the droop phenomenon across different material systems, temperatures, and current densities.

While there is an urgent need for semiconductor-based efficient deep ultraviolet (DUV) sources, the efficiency of AlGaN DUV light-emitting diodes (LEDs) remains very low because the extraction of DUV photons is significantly limited by intrinsic material properties of AlGaN. Here, we present an elegant approach based on a DUV LED having multiple mesa stripes whose inclined sidewalls are covered by a MgF2/Al omni-directional mirror to take advantage of the strongly anisotropic transverse-magnetic polarized emission pattern of AlGaN quantum wells. The sidewall-emission-enhanced DUV LED breaks through the fundamental limitations caused by the intrinsic properties of AlGaN, thus shows a remarkable improvement in light extraction as well as operating voltage. Furthermore, an analytic model is developed to understand and precisely estimate the extraction of DUV photons from AlGaN DUV LEDs, and hence to provide promising routes for maximizing the power conversion efficiency.

Despite a rapidly-growing demand for efficient man-made DUV light sources, widespread adoption of AlGaN-based DUV LEDs is currently obstructed by extremely poor extraction of DUV photons due to the intrinsic material properties of AlGaN including low hole concentration and poor light extraction efficiency (LEE). Conventional LEE-enhancing techniques used for GaInN-based visible LEDs turned out to be ineffective for DUV LEDs due to a strong absorption of DUV light by p-GaN contact layer, and predominant TM polarized anisotropic emission from Al-rich AlGaN multi-quantum well (MQW) active region grown on c-plane sapphire substrate. Therefore, a new LEE-enhancing approach addressing the unique intrinsic property of AlGaN DUV LEDs is strongly desired.In this study, we present DUV LEDs having arrays of TC shaped active mesas coated with MgF2/Al reflectors on the inclined sidewalls to extract strong TM-polarized in-plane emission trough the sapphire substrate. Ray tracing simulations reveal that the TC DUV LEDs show an isotropic emission pattern and much enhanced light-output power in comparison with stripe-type DUV LEDs with the same MgF2/Al reflectors. Consistent with the ray tracing simulation results, the TC DUV LEDs show an isotropic emission pattern with 37.1% higher light-output power as well as lower operating voltage than the stripe-type DUV LEDs. Based on our results, we suggest strategies to design an optimized DUV LEDs for further enhancing the optical and electrical performances simultaneously. In addition, we propose a next generation DUV LED with an array of Al nanoparticles capable of enhancing IQE and LEE simultaneously by surface plasmon resonance coupling.

The efficiency of an AlGaN deep-ultraviolet light-emitting diode with peak emission wavelength of 285 nm is investigated as a function of current over a wide range of temperatures (110 K to 300 K). We find that the efficiency-versus-current curve exhibits unique and distinct features over the entire temperature range including three points of inflection. At low temperatures, the change in slope in the efficiency-versus-current curve is particularly pronounced producing a minimum in the efficiency after which the efficiency rises again. Furthermore, at high current density, the low-temperature efficiency exceeds the room-temperature efficiency. The feature-rich efficiency-versus-current curve is consistent with an enhancement in p-type conductivity by field-ionization of acceptors that occurs in the high-injection regime and is particularly pronounced at low temperatures. Differential conductivity measurements show a marked rise in the high-injection regime that is well correlated to the minimum point in the efficiency-versus-current curve.