Gallium nitride (GaN) has emerged as an essential semiconductor material for energy-efficient lighting and electronic applications owing to its large direct bandgap of 3.4 eV. Present GaN/AlGaN heterostructures seemingly feature an inherently existing, highly-mobile 2-dimensional electron gas (2DEG), which results in normally-on transistor characteristics. Here we report on an ultra-pure GaN/AlGaN layer stack grown by molecular beam epitaxy, in which such a 2DEG is absent at 300 K in the dark, a property previously not demonstrated. Illumination with ultra-violet light however, generates a 2DEG at the GaN/AlGaN interface and the heterostructure becomes electrically conductive. At temperatures below 150 K this photo-conductivity is persistent with an insignificant dependence of the 2D channel density on the optical excitation power. Residual donor impurity concentrations below 10$^{17}$ cm$^{-3}$ in the GaN/AlGaN layer stack are one necessity for our observations. Fabricated transistors manifest that these characteristics enable a future generation of normally-off as well as light-sensitive GaN-based device concepts.
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