It has been demonstrated that we can use interrupted growth mode in metalorganic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) to fabricate nanoscale InGaN self-assembed quantum dots (QDs). With a 12-s growth interruption, we successfully formed InGaN QDs with a typical lateral size of 25 nm and an average height of 4.1 nm. The QDs density is about 2 x 10(10) cm(-2). In contrast, much larger InGaN QDs were obtained without growth interruption. Compared with samples prepared without growth interrupt, a much larger photoluminescence (PL) intensity and a large 67meV PL blue shift was observed from samples prepared with growth interrupt. These results suggest such a growth interrupt method is potentially useful in nitride-based optoelectronic devices grown by MOCVD. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.