Steven P. DenBaars

About

Steven P. DenBaars is a Mitsubishi Professor of Solid State Lighting and Displays and a Distinguished Professor in the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He is also the Co-Director of the Solid State Lighting & Energy Electronics Center and a Group Leader at the IEE. His research interests include the growth of wide-bandgap (GaN based) semiconductors and their application to blue LEDs, laser devices, and high power electronic devices. His work has led to the first U.S. university demonstration of a blue GaN laser diode. Dr. DenBaars has received numerous honors, including being named an IEEE Fellow, receiving the Aron Kressel Award from the IEEE Photonics Society, the Japanese Science of Applied Physics (JSAP) Outstanding Paper Award, the Viterbi Award, and the Distinguished Alumni Award from the University of Southern California. He holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Southern California, an M.S. in Materials Science from the same institution, and a B.S. in Materials and Metallurgical Engineering from the University of Arizona.

Research topics

• Materials science
• Optics
• Optoelectronics
• Physics
• Nanotechnology
• Atomic physics
• Chemistry

Selected publications

• Comparison of size-dependent characteristics of blue and green InGaN microLEDs down to 1 <b> <i>μ</i> </b>m in diameter

  Applied Physics Letters · 2020 · 250 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding

  There is growing interest in microLED devices with lateral dimensions between 1 and 10 μm. However, reductions in external quantum efficiency (EQE) due to increased nonradiative recombination at the surface become an issue at these sizes. Previous attempts to study size-dependent EQE trends have been limited to dimensions above 5 μm, partly due to fabrication challenges. Here, we present size-dependent EQE data for InGaN microLEDs down to 1 μm in diameter fabricated using a process that only uti…

  DOI

• Revealing the importance of light extraction efficiency in InGaN/GaN microLEDs via chemical treatment and dielectric passivation

  Applied Physics Letters · 2020 · 182 citations

  Chemical etching and Al2O3 dielectric passivation were used to minimize nonradiative sidewall defects in InGaN/GaN microLEDs (mesa diameter = 2–100 μm), resulting in an increase in external quantum efficiency (EQE) as the LED size was decreased. Peak EQEs increased from 8%–10% to 12%–13.5% for mesa diameters from 100 μm to 2 μm, respectively, and no measurable leakage currents were seen in current density–voltage (J–V) characteristics. The position and shape of EQE curves for all devices were es…

  DOI

• Improved performance of AlGaInP red micro-light-emitting diodes with sidewall treatments

  Optics Express · 2020 · 161 citations

  Senior authorCorresponding

  devices more than 150%. This indicated that AlGaInP µLEDs with ALD sidewall treatments can be used as the red emitter for full-color µLED display applications.

  DOI

• Unidirectional luminescence from InGaN/GaN quantum-well metasurfaces

  Nature Photonics · 2020 · 119 citations

  DOI

• Light-emitting metalenses and meta-axicons for focusing and beaming of spontaneous emission

  Nature Communications · 2021 · 69 citations

  Phased-array metasurfaces have been extensively used for wavefront shaping of coherent incident light. Due to the incoherent nature of spontaneous emission, the ability to similarly tailor photoluminescence remains largely unexplored. Recently, unidirectional photoluminescence from InGaN/GaN quantum-well metasurfaces incorporating one-dimensional phase profiles has been shown. However, the possibility of generating arbitrary two-dimensional waveforms-such as focused beams-is not yet realized. He…

  DOI

Recent grants

• Understanding Defects Generated by the Low Temperature Aqueous Synthesis of ZnO

  NSF · $330k · 2009–2012

Frequent coauthors

• James S. Speck

  University of California, Santa Barbara

  760 shared

• Shuji Nakamura

  University of California, Santa Barbara

  743 shared

• S. Keller

  University of California, Santa Barbara

  505 shared

• Umesh K. Mishra

  492 shared

• Feng Wu

  University of California, Santa Barbara

  129 shared

• P. Fini

  124 shared

• U. K. Mishra

  Institute of Science and Technology Austria

  119 shared

• Shigefusa F. Chichibu

  Tohoku University

  100 shared

Education

• PhD, Electrical Engineering

  University of Southern California

  1988

• MS, Materials Science

  University of Southern California

  1986

• BS, Metallurgical Engineering

  The University of Arizona

  1984

Awards & honors

• IEEE Fellow
• Aron Kressel Award, IEEE Photonics Society
• Japanese Science of Applied Physics (JSAP) Outstanding Paper…
• Viterbi Award, USC
• Distinguished Alumni Award, University of Southern Californi…

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