Semiconductor light emitting device and semiconductor laser

Abstract

When a laminated semiconductor portion of nitride based compound semiconductor is formed so as to constitute a portion forming a light emitting layer forming portion on a sapphire substrate, the sapphire substrate has an off orientation angle having a tilt relative to an A axis or a M axis in such a way that 0.2°≦θ={θa2+θm2}1/2≦0.3°, wherein 0°≦θa≦0.3°, 0°≦θm≦0.3°, when taking the angle tilted relative to the A axis as θa and to the M axis as θm, and the foregoing nitride based compound semiconductor layers are laminated onto the surface of the off-oriented C plane. Therefore, it is possible to attain a semiconductor light emitting device having the superior characteristic of light emitting by growing the nitride based compound semiconductor on a sapphire substrate with the degree of flatness high and furthermore to attain a semiconductor laser of a small threshold current by forming a cleavage surface finely while improving the degree of flatness by off-orienting a sapphire substrate.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.