TY - JOUR

T1 - Design, fabrication and application of GaN-based micro-LED arrays with individual addressing by n-electrodes

AU - Xie, Enyuan

AU - Stonehouse, Mark

AU - Ferreira, Ricardo

AU - McKendry, Jonathan J. D.

AU - Herrnsdorf, Johannes

AU - He, Xiangyu

AU - Rajbhandari, Sujan

AU - Chun, Hyunchae

AU - Jalajakumari, Aravind V.N.

AU - Almer, Oscar

AU - Faulkner, Grahame

AU - Watson, Ian M.

AU - Gu, Erdan

AU - Henderson, Robert

AU - O'Brien, Dominic

AU - Dawson, Martin D.

PY - 2017/11/14

Y1 - 2017/11/14

N2 - We demonstrate the development, performance, and application of a GaN-basedmicro-light emitting diode (µLED) array sharing a common p-electrode (anode), and with individuallyaddressable n-electrodes (cathodes). Compared to conventional GaN-based LEDarrays, this array design employs a reversed structure of common and individual electrodes,which makes it innovative and compatible with n-type metal-oxide-semiconductor (NMOS)transistor-based drivers for faster modulation. Excellent performance characteristics are illustratedby an example array emitting at 450 nm. At a current density of 17.7 kA/cm2 indirect-current operation, the optical power and small signal electrical-to-optical modulationbandwidth of a single µLED element with 24 µm diameter are over 2.0 mW and 440 MHz,respectively. The optimized fabrication process also ensures a high yield of working µLEDelements per array and excellent element-to-element uniformity of electrical/optical characteristics.Results on visible light communication are presented as an application of an arrayintegrated with an NMOS driver. Data transmission at several hundred Mb/s without bit erroris achieved for single- and multiple-µLED-element operations, under an ON–OFF-keyingmodulation scheme. Transmission of stepped sawtooth waveforms is also demonstrated toconfirm that the µLED elements can transmit discrete multilevel signals.

AB - We demonstrate the development, performance, and application of a GaN-basedmicro-light emitting diode (µLED) array sharing a common p-electrode (anode), and with individuallyaddressable n-electrodes (cathodes). Compared to conventional GaN-based LEDarrays, this array design employs a reversed structure of common and individual electrodes,which makes it innovative and compatible with n-type metal-oxide-semiconductor (NMOS)transistor-based drivers for faster modulation. Excellent performance characteristics are illustratedby an example array emitting at 450 nm. At a current density of 17.7 kA/cm2 indirect-current operation, the optical power and small signal electrical-to-optical modulationbandwidth of a single µLED element with 24 µm diameter are over 2.0 mW and 440 MHz,respectively. The optimized fabrication process also ensures a high yield of working µLEDelements per array and excellent element-to-element uniformity of electrical/optical characteristics.Results on visible light communication are presented as an application of an arrayintegrated with an NMOS driver. Data transmission at several hundred Mb/s without bit erroris achieved for single- and multiple-µLED-element operations, under an ON–OFF-keyingmodulation scheme. Transmission of stepped sawtooth waveforms is also demonstrated toconfirm that the µLED elements can transmit discrete multilevel signals.

U2 - 10.1109/JPHOT.2017.2768478

DO - 10.1109/JPHOT.2017.2768478

M3 - Article

VL - 9

JO - IEEE Photonics Journal

JF - IEEE Photonics Journal

SN - 1943-0655

IS - 6

ER -