The Effect of Carrier Gas and Reactor Pressure on Gallium Nitride Growth in MOCVD Manufacturing Process

Gallium nitride (GaN) is an attractive material for manufacturing light emitting diodes and other electronic devices due to its wide band-gap and superb optoelectronic performance. The quality of GaN thin film determines the reliability and durability of these devices. Metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) is a common technique used to fabricate high-quality GaN thin films. In this paper, GaN growth rate and uniformity in a vertical rotating disk MOCVD reactor are investigated on the basis of a three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model. GaN growth rate is investigated under the influence of reactor pressure, precursor concentration ratio, and composition of the carrier gas mixture. The numerical simulation shows that the carrier gas mixture and the reactor pressure have significant effects on growth rate and uniformity of GaN thin films. It is also found that an appropriate mixture of N₂ and H₂ may be employed as the carrier gas to improve the flow field characteristic in the reactor. This results in an improved crystal growth of GaN thin films.