The effects of tensile stress induced by silicon nitride (Si3N4) passivation on electrical characteristics of AlGaN∕GaN heterostructure field-effect transistors (HFETs) were investigated. The biaxial tensile stress applied to the AlGaN layer was increased with the thickness of the Si3N4 passivation layer, leading to the increase of sheet charge density confined at the heterointerface. The stress-induced charge density was 1.75×1011e∕cm2 for 80-nm-thick Si3N4 and 6.74×1011e∕cm2 for 500-nm-thick Si3N4. The maximum drain current and transconductance of AlGaN∕GaN HFET increased from 769 to 858mA∕mm and from 146 to 155mS∕mm after passivation, respectively.

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Iridium oxide (IrO2) was used as the Schottky barrier materials of GaN metal–semiconductor–metal (MSM) ultraviolet photodetector. Annealing an Ir contact at 500 °C under O2 ambient, the reverse leakage current density at −5 V reduced by the four orders of magnitude, to ∼10−6 A/cm2. Simultaneously, Schottky barrier height and optical transmittance increased to 1.48 eV and 74.8% at 360 nm, respectively. The dramatic improvement originated from the formation of IrO2 by the annealing, resulting in the increase in the responsivity of the GaN MSM photodetector by one order of magnitude, in comparison with the photodetector with Pt Schottky contact.

The effect of preannealing of AlGaN under an oxygen ambient on the improvement of the Schottky barrier height on an AlGaN/GaN heterostructure was studied using synchrotron radiation photoemission spectroscopy. The oxidation annealing increased the Schottky barrier height from 0.59 to 0.84 eV, and dramatically reduced the reverse leakage current. The group-III elements (Ga, Al) outdiffused to the surface to form group-III oxides during the annealing, leaving group-III vacancies behind. The surface Fermi level shifted to the energy levels of group-III vacancies, leading to the enhancement of Schottky properties of AlGaN.

A room-temperature Ti/Al Ohmic contact on n-type GaN was obtained by surface treatment using Cl2 inductively coupled plasma treatment. The specific contact resistivity was dramatically decreased from the Schottky behavior to 9.4×10−6 Ω cm2 by the treatment. The binding energy of the Ga–N bond and the atomic ratio of Ga/N were simultaneously increased after the plasma treatment. This provides evidence that N vacancies, acting as donors for electrons, were produced at the etched surface, resulting in a shift of the Fermi level near to the conduction band. This leads to the reduction in contact resistivity through the decrease of the Schottky barrier for the conduction of electrons.