Thin films of aluminum nitride (AlN) fabricated by reactive deposition were characterized in order to examine the electrical insulation properties suitable for a gate insulator. For a series of AlN films deposited with a variation of the amount of Al flux at a fixed N flux, compositional and chemical analyses were performed using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and elastic recoil detection analysis (ERDA). Combined with the result of current-voltage (I-V) measurement, it is found that the insulation properties are correlated with the compositional ratio between Al and N estimated by the ERDA measurement; a good electrical insulation with a minimal leak current of the order of 10(-9) A/cm(2) at a high electric field 1MV/cm is achieved in the film of nearly stoichiometric compositional ratio of Al/N, in which the dominance of the Al-N bonding state is confirmed in the XPS measurement. On the other hand, the incorporation of oxygen, probably caused by the surface oxidization due to the exposure to the air, has little effect on the electrical properties. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.