Photoreflectance, absorption, and nuclear resonance reaction studies of AlxGa1−x As grown by molecular-beam epitaxy

Abstract

The photoreflectance (PR) spectra of bulk AlxGa1−xAs alloys with x<=0.45 were studied. The observed line shapes from different samples suggest that the PR technique is very sensitive to the material quality, surface condition, and the background impurities. The energy gap derived from the PR spectra compared well to that obtained from the absorption spectra. The relationship between the energy gap and the Al mole fraction value x was established through the nuclear resonance reaction analysis. The electric field near the surface was calculated from the periodicity of Franz–Keldysh oscillations observed in many of the samples. From our analysis, we believe that the number of oscillations shown in PR spectra corresponds to sample quality, in general. We also believe that the low-field-like line shape is mainly caused by the fluctuation of Al distribution along the growth direction. An additional feature related to the impurity transition was also observed in the spectra.