Cz. Fregonara et al., Low-temperature spectrally resolved cathodoluminescence study of degradation in opto-electronic and microelectronic devices, MICRON, 31(3), 2000, pp. 269-275
This study reports on the microcharacterization of devices for optoelectron
ic and for microelectronic applications using low temperature (T = 5 and 77
K) spectrally resolved cathodoluminescence (SCL). The mechanisms leading t
o compositional inhomogeneities in the regrowth regions of InP-based butt-c
oupled laser-waveguide devices for semiconducting optical amplifiers (SOAs)
and for defect generation in the active and cladding layers of GaAs based
pump lasers for erbium-doped optical fibre amplifiers (EDFAs) were studied.
Beryllium outdiffusion in the base regions of GaAs-based heterojunction bi
polar transistors (HBTs) after bias ageing was also studied. By comparing t
he CL results with TEM, SIMS and HRXRD studies and with the existing litera
ture, the observed growth and operation induced defects were attributed, re
spectively, to the following mechanisms: recombination-enhanced defect glid
e (REDG) in the pump lasers, recombination enhanced impurity diffusion (REI
D) in the HBTs and electrostatically induced growth flux instabilities in t
he butt-coupled laser-waveguide devices. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All
rights reserved.