Breakdown voltage analysis for the new RESURF AlGaN/GaN HEMTs

This paper demonstrates that the depletion process for AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility tran-sistors(HEMTs)is different than that for silicon power devices by analyzing active region depletion.Based on the special breakdown principle that occurs in AlGaN/GaN HEMTs,we propose a new reduced surface field AlGaN/GaN HEMT with a double low-density drain(LDD)and a positively charged region near the drain to optimize the surface electric field and increase the breakdown voltage.In this structure,two negative charge regions with different doses are introduced into the polarization AlGaN layer to form a double LDD and decrease the high electric field near the gate by depleting two-dimensional electron gas.A positively charged region is added to the electrode near the drain to decrease the high electric field peak at the drain edge.By applying ISE(integrated systems engineering)simulation software,we verify that the virtual gate effect occurs in the AlGaN/GaN HEMTs.The breakdown voltage is improved from 257 V in the conventional structure to 550 V in the proposed structure.