Enhancing the piezoelectric modulus of wurtzite AlN by ion beam strain engineering

The piezoelectric modulus of wurtzite aluminum nitride (AlN) is a critical material parameter for electrical components, ultimately contributing to the energy efficiency and achievable bandwidth modern communication devices. Here, we demonstrate that introduction metallic point-defects (Ti, Zr, Hf) improves as-received, unstrained, epitaxially grown AlN. metals are incorporated by ion implantation with an acceleration 30 keV fluence 1015 at cm?2, which causes elongation along c-axis. stored internal strain increases polarization thin AlN layer. This can equivalently be described enhancement d33. incorporation 0.1 at. % Ti enhances ?30%; significantly exceeding gains obtained alloying same amount Sc.