Omnidirectional reflective contacts for light-emitting diodes

An electrically conductive omnidirectional reflector (ODR) is demonstrated in an AlGaInP light-emitting diode (LED). The ODR serves as p-type contact and comprises the semiconductor, a metal layer and an intermediate low-refractive index dielectric layer. The dielectric layer is perforated by an array of AuZn microcontacts thus enabling electrical conductivity. It is shown that the ODR significantly increases light extraction from an AlGaInP LED as compared to a reference LED employing a distributed Bragg reflector (DBR). External quantum efficiencies of 18% and 11% are obtained for the ODR- and the DBR-LED, respectively.