The availability of new piezoelectric materials compatible with silicon chip integration for micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) application is a highly attractive prospect. These new materials will help to bridge the gap between mechanical and electronic devices, making MEMS increasingly small and efficient. AlN is today’s industry’s standard and research is intensifying worldwide on AlN derivatives such as ScAlN. By alloying AlN with Sc, the crystal lattice is locally distorted due to the phase competition between the rock-salt ScN and wurtzite AlN structures, resulting in a progressive transition of AlN from wurtzite into a hexagonal-layered structure as the amount of Sc dopant atoms increases. This, in turn, induces an enhancement of the piezoelectric coefficients of ScAlN up to 50% Sc content (see figure).

Group-III nitrides are material compounds of nitrogen (N) and the elements in the first column of the p-element block of the periodic table (technically, group IIIB): boron (B), aluminium (Al), gallium (Ga), indium (In) and thallium (Tl). The compounds AlN, GaN, InN and their alloys are technologically important semiconductors with multiple applications in optoelectronics, in particular incorporated in LEDs for light production. Much of my work during my PhD at the Tyndall National Institute focused on the study of some of the properties of these materials.