Improved Schottky contacts to InGaN alloys by a photoelectrochemical treatment

We report on improved electrical properties of Schottky contacts to InGaN alloys by introducing a photoelectrochemical treatment. The Schottky barrier height determined by a thermionic-field emission model, a dominating forward-current-transport mechanism, increased by 0.15 eV from 1.02 eV for conventional contacts to 1.17 eV for those with photoelectrochemical treatment at room temperature, while the ideality factors is closer to 1 after photoelectrochemical treatment. Furthermore, the reverse leakage mechanism varies from an ohmic transport mechanism at relatively low voltage and space charge-limited current mechanism at relatively high voltage for conventional contacts to Frenkel–Poole emission for improved Schottky contacts, which is attributed to partly removing surface states by the photoelectrochemical treatment.