Recent advances in thin film technologies, and their materials properties, have led to significant characterization challenges. For instance, the characterization of quantum well structures on samples with anti-reflective textures, patterned substrates, or the presence of crystalline defects can be very complicated ultimately preventing the access to the basic information required. However, the accurate determination of ultrathin layer composition, thickness and morphology are critical for process development, evaluation of device quality or failure analysis. At EAG Laboratories we have developed a specific analytical protocol for such challenging characterization problems on these devices.
In this application note we show the effectiveness of thin layer quantification by Aberration Corrected Scanning Transmission Electron Microscopy (AC-STEM) coupled with an energy dispersive x-ray detector (STEM-EDS) for GaN-based samples.