Origin of the abnormal behavior of contact resistance in Ohmic contacts to laser-irradiated n-type GaN

Abnormal behavior of contact resistance with annealing in Ohmic contacts to laser-irradiated n-GaN is investigated. Ti/Al contacts on as-grown n-GaN shows no change in contact resistivity with annealing at the temperature range of 100–400 °C. However, the annealing results in the significant increase in contact resistivity in the contacts on laser-irradiated n-GaN. Synchrotron radiation photoemission study reveals the reduction of the concentration of donor-like N vacancies near the surface by the annealing. These results suggest that preventing the annihilation of N vacancies in the laser-irradiated n-GaN is important in improving the performance of vertical-structure GaN-based light-emitting diodes fabricated by laser lift-off.