Tunable density of two-dimensional electron gas in GaN-based heterostructures: The effects of buffer acceptor and channel width

This is a theoretical study of GaN-based heterostructures with unintentionally doped (UID) GaN channel layer and high-resistivity (HR) GaN buffer layer doped by deep acceptors. Self-consistent Schrödinger-Poisson (SP) numerical simulation shows that, by increasing the acceptor concentration in the HR buffer or narrowing the width of UID channel, the quantum confinement of two-dimensional electron gas (2DEG) is enhanced, while the sheet density of 2DEG is reduced. The tuning effect of 2DEG density is attributed to the depletion effect of negative space charges composed of ionized acceptors located in the region between the UID channel and the Fermi-level pinned region in the HR buffer. For the heterostructure without the UID channel, the 2DEG can be depleted as the acceptor concentration is beyond a critical value. However, by inserting a UID channel layer, the depletion effect of buffer acceptor on 2DEG density is reduced. To gain a further insight into the physics, a simple analytical model is developed, which reproduces well the results of SP simulation. By comparing our theoretical results with the experimental ones, a good agreement is reached, thus the validity of our model is verified.