Electrical conduction along dislocations in plastically deformed n-GaN single crystals was investigated using scanning spread resistance microscopy. Many conductive spots were observed in the images, which corresponded to electrical conduction along the dislocations introduced by deformation. The introduced dislocations were b = (a/3)<1¯2•0> edge dislocations, parallel to the [00•1] direction. The current values at the spots, normalized by the background current value, were greater than 100. Previous work had shown that grown-in edge dislocations in GaN were non-conductive. The high conductivity of the deformation-introduced edge dislocations in the present work suggested that the conductivity depended sensitively upon the dislocation core-structure.

Electrical Conduction along Dislocations in Plastically Deformed GaN. Y.Kamimura, T.Yokoyama, H.Oiwa, K.Edagawa, I.Yonenaga: IOP Conference Series - Materials Science and Engineering, 2009, 3[1], 012010