Title :
A Remote-Oxygen-Plasma Surface Treatment Technique for III-Nitride Heterojunction Field-Effect Transistors
Author :
Yi-Che Lee ; Tsung-Ting Kao ; Merola, Joseph J. ; Shyh-Chiang Shen
Author_Institution :
Sch. of Electr. & Comput. Eng., Georgia Inst. of Technol., Atlanta, GA, USA
Abstract :
We present a paper on the influence of an oxygen-plasma treatment technique for III-nitride (III-N) heterojunction field-effect transistors (HFETs) using a plasma-enhanced atomic layer deposition (PE-ALD) system. The oxygen plasma is excited in a remote location to avoid the plasma damage. After the plasma treatment, the threshold voltage was shifted from -0.25 to 0 V and a two-orders-of-magnitude reduction of the drain leakage current was observed in recessed-gate AlGaN/AlN/GaN HFETs. The capacitance-voltage characteristics of gate diodes showed indistinguishable hysteresis. Improved gate-lag and lowered dynamic ON-resistance were also observed in the fabricated AlGaN/AlN/GaN HFETs after the oxygen-plasma treatment. The results indicate that the oxygen-plasma treatment using a PE-ALD system could be a promising approach to improve the device switching performance in III-N HFETs.
Keywords :
III-V semiconductors; aluminium compounds; atomic layer deposition; gallium compounds; high electron mobility transistors; leakage currents; surface treatment; wide band gap semiconductors; AlGaN-AlN-GaN; capacitance voltage characteristics; drain leakage current; gate diodes; heterojunction field effect transistors; plasma damage; plasma enhanced atomic layer deposition system; remote oxygen plasma surface treatment technique; Aluminum gallium nitride; Gallium nitride; HEMTs; III-V semiconductor materials; Logic gates; MODFETs; Surface treatment; AlGaN/GaN; field-effect transistors (FETs); heterostructures; oxidization; oxygen; plasma treatment; wide bandgap;
Journal_Title :
Electron Devices, IEEE Transactions on
DOI :
10.1109/TED.2013.2295828
