A Freestanding GaN/HfO ₂ Membrane Grown by Molecular Beam Epitaxy for GaN–Si Hybrid MEMS

Combination of GaN light source and Si-microelectromechanical systems (MEMSs) is a promising hybrid structure for optical MEMS. As one of GaN-Si hybrid structures, a freestanding GaN/HfO2membrane was fabricated on Si substrate. Unlike conventional GaN membrane on Si substrate, the fabricated membrane had a tensile stress by using the HfO2layer. Therefore, the GaN/HfO2membrane was flat enough to be useful for several MEMS. The GaN crystal was grown by molecular beam epitaxy on the HfO2layer deposited on Si substrate. The surface of the HfO2layer was nitrified before GaN crystal growth, and thus, a part of HfO2surface was changed to HfN, the lattice of which matched well to that of GaN. The characteristics of the GaN crystal grown on the nitrified HfO2layer were also investigated.