High Resolution X-ray Diffraction of GaN Grown on Sapphire Substrates

X-ray rocking curves are frequently used to assess the structural quality of GaN thin films. In order to understand the information given by the line shape, the authors need to know the primary mechanism by which the curves are broadened. The GaN films used in this study were grown by low pressure metalorganic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) on (00{sm_bullet}1) sapphire substrates. GaN films with both broad and very narrow (open detector linewidth of 40 arcseconds for the (00{sm_bullet}2) GaN reflection) rocking curves are examined in this work. Reciprocal space maps of both symmetric and asymmetric reciprocal lattice points are used to determine that the cause of the broadening of GaN rocking curves is a limited in-plane coherence length.