Recoverable degradation of blue InGaN-based light emitting diodes submitted to 3 MeV proton irradiation

This paper reports on the degradation and recovery of two different series of commercially available InGaN-based blue light emitting diodes submitted to proton irradiation at 3 MeV and various fluences (1011, 1013, and 1014 p+/cm2). After irradiation, we detected (i) an increase in the series resistance, in the sub-turn-on current and in the ideality factor, (ii) a spatially uniform drop of the output optical power, proportional to fluence, and (iii) a reduction of the capacitance of the devices. These results suggest that irradiation induced the generation of non-radiative recombination centers near the active region. This hypothesis is further confirmed by the results of the recovery tests carried out at low temperature (150 °C).

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