Electrical conduction along dislocations in plastically deformed GaN

Abstract

Electrical conduction along dislocations in plastically deformed n-GaN single crystals has been investigated by scanning spread resistance microscopy (SSRM). In the SSRM images, many conductive spots have been observed, which correspond to electrical conduction along the dislocations introduced by deformation. Here, the introduced dislocations are b=(a/3)<12̄10> edge dislocations parallel to the [0001] direction. The current values at the spots normalized to the background current value are larger than 100. Previous works have shown that grown-in edge dislocations in GaN are nonconductive. The high conductivity of the deformation-introduced edge dislocations in the present work suggests that the conductivity depends sensitively on the dislocation core structure. © 2009 IOP Publishing Ltd.