Influence of electron injection on performance of GaN photodetectors

It is demonstrated that short-time (up to 1200 s) electron injection into the p-region of GaN p–n junction, as a result of forward bias application, leads to a long-term multifold enhancement of the device peak responsivity as well as to a spectral broadening of the photoresponse. The effect is found to persist for several days and is related to an increased minority carrier diffusion length in the p region, due to an injected electron trapping on deep levels associated with Mg acceptors.