Analysis of photoluminescence efficiency of annealed GaInNAs quantum well grown by solid source molecular beam epitaxy

The carrier dynamics of a 7.5 nm GaInNAs quantum well (QW) are studied by photoluminescence (PL) at a low temperature regime of 4 K to 150 K. The PL emission efficiency of the QW is initially evaluated to examine the recombination mechanisms in the QW. A dual-activation-energy model is later found to fit the integrated PL intensity vs. temperature curve better than a single-activation-energy model. The two states that correspond to the above activation energies could have resulted in a much faster PL intensity quenching in the GaInNAs QW as compared to that of a reference GaInAs QW. One of the states is identified as a localized state that traps carriers at a low temperature range of less than ∼100 K. The other state has a larger quenching effect at temperatures higher than 100 K and this state is not studied in this paper. By fitting the original PL spectra with two Gaussian functions, the temperature dependent PL integrated intensity of both Gaussian functions was also studied to further characterize the GaInNAs QW. The analysis gives evidence of the localization behaviour in this QW.