  To date, the generic polarization of Bernardini, Fiorentini and Vanderbilt
(PBFV) has been widely used to address the issue of polarity in III-V nitride
semiconductors, but improvements in nitride materials and the performance of
optoelectronic devices have been limited. The current first-principles
calculation for the electronic structures of nm-scale [0001] GaN films show
that the internal electric fields and the band tilt of these films are in
opposite direction to those predicted by PBFV. Additionally, it is determined
that an intrinsic self-regulated charge transfer across the film limits the
electrostatic potential difference across the film, which renders the local
conduction band energy minimum (at the Ga-terminated surface) approximately
equal to the local valence band energy maximum (at the N-terminated surface).
This effect is found to occur in films thicker than ~4nm.
