Transport and reaction behaviors of precursors during metalorganic vapor phase epitaxy of gallium nitride

Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) based reactor modeling, combined with gas phase kinetics studies, was used to determine the transport and reaction behaviors within a high performance vertical GaN MOVPE reactor. The typical thermal fluid behaviors have been initially identified, which are believed to be closely correlated to the growth of device quality of GaN-based materials. The growth chemistry, under these typical fluid conditions, was studied by increasing the complexity of growth chemistry model in a step-wise fashion. The high gas flow rate typically employed in GaN MOVPE results in a very thin high-temperature flow sheet above the growth front. Within this thin high-temperature flow sheet, a stratified chemical structure is formed as a result of the unique thermal fluid environment. This stratified structure is closely related to the transport and reaction behaviors during GaN MOVPE processes.