Abstract
Due to the intrinsic spontaneous and piezoelectric polarization effect, III-nitride semiconductor heterostructures are promising candidates for generating 2D electron gas (2DEG) system. Among III-nitrides, InN is predicted to be the best conductive-channel material because its electrons have the smallest effective mass and it exhibits large band offsets at the heterointerface of GaN/InN or AlN/InN. Until now, that prediction has remained theoretical, due to a giant gap between the optimal growth windows of InN and GaN, and the difficult epitaxial growth of InN in general. The experimental realization of 2DEG at an InGaN/InN heterointerface grown by molecular beam epitaxy is reported here. The directly probed electron mobility and the sheet electron density of the InGaN/InN heterostructure are determined by Hall-effect measurements at room temperature to be 2.29 x 10(3) cm(2) V-1 s(-1) and 2.14 x 10(13) cm(-2), respectively, including contribution from the InN bottom layer. The Shubnikov-de Haas results at 3 K confirm that the 2DEG has an electron density of 3.30 x 10(12) cm(-2) and a quantum mobility of 1.48 x 10(3) cm(2) V-1 s(-1). The experimental observations of 2DEG at the InGaN/InN heterointerface have paved the way for fabricating higher-speed transistors based on an InN channel.