Study of aluminum and gold as the gate electrode material on silicon nitride based MIS devices

In order to study the role of aluminum and gold as the gate electrode material, we have deposited silicon nitride ®lms onto p-type silicon substrates via r.f. glow-discharge deposition and have fabricated metal-insulator-semiconductor (MIS) devices on these ®lms using aluminum or gold as the top electrode material. Considerable penetration of aluminum gate material into our silicon nitride ®lms is observed. The resulting decrease of the effective thickness of the MIS devices have led to tunneling in these ®lms. However, no appreciable penetration of gold gate material is observed. Our study demonstrates clearly that gold is superior to aluminum as the gate electrode material in MIS devices for being suitable even when poor quality silicon nitride ®lms are used as insulator in MIS devices. # 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved