Thin-wall tubes composed of nitride semiconductors (III-N compounds) based on GaN/InAlN multiple quantum wells (MQWs) are fabricated by metal-organic vapor-phase epitaxy in a simple and full III-N approach. The synthesis of such MQW-tubes is based on the growth of N-polar c-axis vertical GaN wires surrounded by a core-shell MQW heterostructure followed by in situ selective etching using controlled H2/NH3 annealing at 1010 °C to remove the inner GaN wire part. After this process, well-defined MQW-based tubes having nonpolar m-plane orientation exhibit UV light near 330 nm up to room temperature, consistent with the emission of GaN/InAlN MQWs. Partially etched tubes reveal a quantum-dotlike signature originating from nanosized GaN residuals present inside the tubes. The possibility to fabricate in a simple way thin-wall III-N tubes composed of an embedded MQW-based active region offering controllable optical emission properties constitutes an important step forward to develop new nitride devices such as emitters, detectors or sensors based on tubelike nanostructures.
Keywords: MOVPE; Nanotubes; UV emission; multiple quantum wells; nitride semiconductors; quantum dots.