Inductively coupled plasma etching of GaN using BCl3/Cl2chemistry and photoluminescence studies of the etched samples

Inductively coupled plasma (ICP) etching of GaN is investigated using BCl 3 /Cl 2 chemistry. The maximum etch rate is observed when the percentage of Cl 2 in the BCl 3 /Cl 2 gas mixture is about 80-100%. From photoluminescence (PL) study of the etched GaN samples, we found that the ICP etching creates non-radiative surface recombination states and it has been observed that the creation of surface states is a minimum when the Cl 2 in the BCl 3 /Cl 2 mixture is about 90-100%. The atomic force microscope (AFM) study shows that the etching does not make the surface rough and the root mean square (rms) roughness of the etched surface is about 3-5 nm.