Strong blue emission from GaN isoelectronically doped with arsenic

We have shown that for GaN films grown by molecular beam epitaxy, strong blue emission is observed for samples isoelectronically doped with arsenic. This blue emission is very strong and can be observed at room temperature in normal room lighting and is more than one order of magnitude stronger than the band edge emission in regular GaN films. The films were grown on sapphire substrates by plasma-assisted molecular beam epitaxy, using both As2 and As4. In this paper we present detailed studies of the influence of the growth conditions including the arsenic flux, the group V:III ratio and substrate temperature on the intensity of the blue emission from arsenic doped GaN. This work suggests that GaNAs may potentially be a replacement for InGaN alloys in optical device applications.