Blue to deep UV light emission from a p-Si/AlN/Au heterostructure

Undoped AlN thin film has been grown on p-Si (111) by metal-organic chemical-vapor deposition. The p-Si/AlN/Au heterostructured light-emitting diode was further fabricated and investigated. The current-voltage characteristic showed a typical back-to-back diode behavior, which is responsible for the electroluminescence at both forward and reverse bias. A deep UV emission at 283 nm as well as a UV emission at 380 nm was observed from the forward biased p-Si/AlN/Au diode, while a blue emission at 490 nm was detected from the diode under reverse bias. The recombination mechanism for each emission band was discussed based on the energy band diagram.