212,594 research outputs found
Fabrication and characterisation of novel Ge MOSFETs
No full textAs high-k dielectrics are introduced into commercial Si CMOS (Complimentary Metal Oxide Semiconductor) microelectronics, the 40 year channel/dielectric partnership of Si/SiO2 is ended and the door opened for silicon to be replaced as the active channel material in MOSFETs (Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field Effect Transistor). Germanium is a good candidate as it has higher bulk carrier mobilities than silicon. In addition, Si and Ge form a thermodynamically stable SiGe alloy of any composition, allowing Ge to be implemented as a thin layer on the surface of a standard Si substrate. This thesis is a practical investigation on several aspects of Ge CMOS technology.
High-k dielectric Ge p-MOSFETs are electrically characterised. A large variation in interface state densities is demonstrated to be responsible for a threshold voltage shift and this is proportional to reciprocal peak mobility due to the Coulomb scattering of carriers by charged states. A theoretical mobility is fitted to that measured at 4.2 K and confirms that interface states are the main source of interface charged impurities.
The model demonstrates a reduction in the interface charged impurity density in p-MOSFETs that underwent a PMA (Post Metallisation Anneal) in hydrogen atmosphere and that the anneal also reduces the RMS (Root Mean Square) dielectric/semiconductor interface roughness, from an average of 0.60 nm to 0.48 nm.
High-k strained Ge p-MOSFETs are electrically characterised and have peak mobilities at 300 K (470 cm2 V-1 s-1) and 4.2 K (1780 cm2 V-1 s-1) far in excess of those measured for the unstrained Ge p-MOSFETs (285 cm2 V-1 s-1,785 cm2 V-1 s-1 respectively). Strained Ge n-MOSFETs perform significantly worse than standard Si P, - MOSFETs primarily due to a high source/drain resistance.
A 10 nm thick SiGe-01 (On Insulator) layer with a Ge composition of 58% is obtained from a 55 nm Si0_88Ge1o2. initial layer on 100 nm Si-Ol substrate via the germanium condensation technique. For the first time, germanium is demonstrated to diffuse through the BOX (Buried OXide) during Ge-condensation and into the underlying Si substrate. An order of magnitude increase in the calculated ITOX (Internal Thermal OXidation) rate of the BOX in the final stages of Ge-condensation is hypothesised to be responsible for stopping this diffusion
Ge-on-Si single-photon avalanche diode detectors: design, modeling, fabrication, and characterization at wavelengths 1310 and 1550 nm
No full textThe design, modeling, fabrication, and characterization of single-photon avalanche diode detectors with an epitaxial Ge absorption region grown directly on Si are presented. At 100 K, a single-photon detection efficiency of 4% at 1310 nm wavelength was measured with a dark count rate of ~ 6 megacounts/s, resulting in the lowest reported noise-equivalent power for a Ge-on-Si single-photon avalanche diode detector (1×10-14 WHz-1/2). The first report of 1550 nm wavelength detection efficiency measurements with such a device is presented. A jitter of 300 ps was measured, and preliminary tests on after-pulsing showed only a small increase (a factor of 2) in the normalized dark count rate when the gating frequency was increased from 1 kHz to 1 MHz. These initial results suggest that optimized devices integrated on Si substrates could potentially provide performance comparable to or better than that of many commercially available discrete technologies
Laser-vibrometric ultrasonic characterization of resonant modes and quality factors of Ge membranes
No full textThe vibrations of a single-crystal germanium (Ge) membrane are studied in air and vacuum using laser vibrometry, in order to determine mechanical properties such as Q-factors, tensile stress, anisotropy, and robustness to shock. Resonance modes up to 3:2 are identified, giving a residual stress measurement of 0.22 GPa, consistent with the value obtained from x-ray relaxation studies. The membrane is found to be isotropic, with Q-factors ranging from around 40 at atmospheric pressure to over 3200 at 5 x 10-4 mbar, significantly lower than those found in polycrystalline Ge micromechanical devices. The robustness to shock is explained through the high resonance mode frequencies and the dissipation mechanism into the substrate, which is a direct consequence of having a high quality film with low residual tensile stress, giving the potential for such films to be used in optoelectronic devices
[Report to Chief J. E. Curry, by an unknown author #1]
No full textReport to Chief J. E. Curry, by an unknown author. The report contains a list of officers who gave depositions to the United States Attorney
[Report to Chief J. E. Curry, by an unknown author #2]
No full textReport to Chief J. E. Curry, by an unknown author. The report contains a list of officers who gave depositions to the United States Attorney
Mechanism of vertical Ge nanowire nucleation on Si (111) during subeutectic annealing and growth
No full textThe direct integration of Ge nanowires with silicon is of interest in multiple applications. In this work, we describe the growth of high-quality, vertically oriented Ge nanowires on Si (111) substrates utilizing a completely sub-Au-Si-eutectic annealing and growth procedure. With all other conditions remaining identical, annealing below the Au-Si eutectic results in successful heteroepitaxial nucleation and growth of Ge nanowires on Si substrate while annealing above the Au-Si eutectic leads to randomly oriented growth. A model is presented to elucidate the effect of the annealing temperature, in which we hypothesized that sub-Au-Si-eutectic annealing leads to the formation of a single and well-oriented interface, essential to template heteroepitaxial nucleation. These results are critically dependent on substrate preparation and lead to the creation of integrated nanowire systems with a low thermal budget process
Electrodeposited Ni/Ge and germanide schottky barriers for nanoelectronics applications
No full textIn recent years metal/semiconductor Schottky barriers have found numerous applications in nanoelectronics. The work presented in this thesis focuses on the improvement of a few of the relevant devices using electrodeposition of metal on Ge for Schottky barrier fabrication. This low energy metallisation technique offers numerous advantages over the physical vapour deposition techniques. Electrical characteristics of the grown diodes show a high quality rectifying behaviour with extremely low leakage currents even on highly doped Ge. A non-Arrhenius behaviour of the temperature dependence is observed for the grown Ni/Ge diodes on lowly doped Ge that is explained by a spatial variation of the barrier heights. The inhomogeneity of the barrier hights is explained in line with an intrinsic surface states model for Ge. The understanding of the intrinsic surface states will help to create ohmic contacts for doped n-MOSFETs. NiGe were formed single phase by annealing. Results reveal that by using these high-quality germanide Schottky barriers as the source/drain, the subthreshold leakage currents of a Schottky barrier MOSFET could be minimised, in particular, due to the very low drain/body junction leakage current exhibited by the electrodeposited diodes. The Ni/Ge diodes on highly doped Ge show negative differential conductance at low temperature. This effect is attributed to the intervalley electron transfer in Ge conduction band to a low mobility valley. The results show experimentally that Schottky junctions could be used for hot electron injection in transferred-electron devices. A vertical Co/Ni/Si structure has been fabricated for spin injection and detection in Si. It is shown that the system functions electrically well although no magnetoresistance indicative of spin injection was observed
High quality Schottky contacts for limiting leakage currents in Ge-based Schottky barrier MOSFETs
No full textSchottky barrier (SB) Ge channel MOSFETs suffer from high drain-body leakage at the required elevated substrate doping concentrations to suppress source-drain leakage. Here we show that electrodeposited Ni-Ge and NiGe/Ge Schottky diodes on highly doped Ge show low off current, which might make them suitable for SB p-MOSFETs. The Schottky diodes showed rectification of up to 5 orders in magnitude. At low forward biases the overlap of the forward current density curves for the as deposited Ni/n-Ge and NiGe/n-Ge Schottky diodes indicates Fermi-level pinning in the Ge band gap. The SB height for electrons remains virtually constant at 0.52 eV (indicating a hole barrier height of 0.14 eV) under various annealing temperatures. The series resistance decreases with increasing annealing temperature in agreement with four point probe measurements indicating the lower specific resistance of NiGe as compared to Ni, which is crucial for high drive current in SB p-MOSFETs. We show by numerical simulation that by incorporating such high quality Schottky diodes in the source/drain of a Ge channel PMOS, highly doped substrate could be used to minimize the subthreshold source to drain leakage current
Molten Au/Ge alloy migration in Ge nanowires
No full textHerein, we report time-resolved in situ transmission electron microscopy observation of Au particle melting at a Ge nanowire tip, subsequent forming of Au/Ge alloy liquid, and its migrating within the Ge nanowire. The migration direction and position of the Au/Ge liquid can be controlled by the applied voltage and the migration speed shows a linear deceleration in the nanowire. In a migration model proposed, the relevant dynamic mechanisms (electromigration, thermodiffusion, and viscous force, etc.) are discussed in detail. This work associated with the liquid mass transport in the solid nanowires should provide new insights into the crystal growth, interface engineering, and fabrication of the heterogeneous nanostructure-based devices
- …
