Effect of annealing on electrical properties of radio-frequency-sputtered ZnO films

We report on the electrical properties of ZnO films and devices grown on different substrates by radio-frequency magnetron sputtering. The films grown on c-plane sapphire were annealed in the range 800–1,000°C. The electron concentration increased with annealing temperature reaching 1.4×10¹⁹ cm^?3 for 1,000°C. Mobility also increased, however, reaching its maximum value 64.4 cm²/V · sec for 950°C anneal. High-performance Schottky diodes were fabricated on ZnO films grown on n-type 6H-SiC by depositing Au/Ni(300/300 Å). After annealing at 900°C, the leakage current (at ?5 V reverse bias) decreased from 2.2 × 10^?7 A to ～5.0 × 10^?8 A after annealing at 900°C, the forward current increased by a factor of 2, and the ideality factor decreased from 1.5 to 1.03. The ZnO films were also grown on p-type 6H-SiC, and n-ZnO/p-SiC heterostructure diodes were fabricated. The p-n diode performance increased dramatically after annealing at 950°C. The leakage current decreased from 2.0×10^?4 A to 3.0×10^?7 A at ?10 V reverse bias, and the forward current increased slightly from 2.7 mA to 3.9 mA at 7 V forward bias; the ideality factor of the annealed diode was estimated as 2.2, while that for the as-grown sample was considerably higher.     

Phosphorus implantation into 4H-silicon carbide

Sheet resistances in nitrogen- and phosphorus-implanted 4H-SiC are measured to assess the time and temperature dependencies of this variable. In 4H-SiC implanted with 3 × 10¹⁵ cm^?2 nitrogen ions to a depth of 2800 Å, the minimum sheet resistance observed is 534 Ω/□. The minimum sheet resistance in 4H-SiC implanted with 4 × 10¹⁵ cm^?2 phosphorus ions to a depth of 4000 Å is 51 Ω/□, a record low value for any implanted element into any polytype of SiC. Time-independent sheet resistances are observed following anneals at 1700°C for nitrogen and phosphorus samples. Lower temperature anneals produce sheet resistances which decrease monotonically with increasing time of anneal. Overall, sheet resistances from phosphorus-implanted 4H-SiC are an order of magnitude below those measured from nitrogen implanted samples. The response of phosphorus to low-temperature annealing is significant, and sheet resistances below 500 Ω/□ are achieved at 1200°C. Activation of phosphorus is attempted in an oxidizing atmosphere with and without prior argon annealing. A three-hour gate oxidation in wet O₂ at 1150°C, followed by a 30 min argon anneal, produced a sheet resistance of 1081 Ω/□. Oxidation after argon annealing caused sheet resistances to increase by about 20% compared to samples subjected solely to argon annealing. It is also found that oxide growth rates are much higher over phosphorus implanted than over unimplanted 4H-SiC. Reasons for the disparity in sheet resistances between nitrogen and phosphorus implants, and for the difference in oxide growth rates are suggested.     

Defects in annealed 1.5 MeV boron implanted p-type silicon

Effects of temperature and dosage on the evolution of extended defects during annealing of MeV ion-implanted Czochralski (CZ) p-type (001) silicon have been studied using transmission electron microcopy. Excess interstitials generated in a 1 10¹⁵ cm⁻²/1.5 MeV B⁺ implanted Si have been found to transform into extended interstitial {311} defects upon rapid thermal annealing at 800°C for 15 sec. During prolonged furnace annealing at 960°C for 1 h, some of the {311} defects grow longer at the expense of the smaller ones, and the average width of the defects seems to decrease at the same time. Formation of stable dislocation loops appears to occur only above a certain threshold annealing temperature (∼1000°C). The leakage current in diodes fabricated on 1.5 MeV B⁺ implanted wafers was found to be higher for a dosage of 1 10¹⁴cm⁻² and less, as compared to those fabricated with a dosage of 5 10¹⁴ cm⁻² and more. The difference in the observed leakage current has been attributed to the presence of dislocations in the active device region of the wafers that were implanted with the lower dosage.     

A new MOS-gate bipolar transistor for power switches

A new monolithic integrated power device, the MOS-gate transistor (MGT), which consists of a bipolar transistor for an output stage and two MOSFET's for a driver stage, has been investigated. The purpose of the study was to obtain a power switch having characteristics of an easy drive, a short turn-off time, and a high current density. The developed device structure featured the integration of three elements into a small cell from a large number of which the MGT chip was constructed. This device had no parasitic thyristor, making it free from the latchup phenomenon. Unit MGT devices with a blocking voltage of 400-500 V were fabricated. A high current density of 90 A/cm²at a collector-emitter voltage of 2 V and a short turn-off time of less than 1 µs were obtained. The MGT devices, which contained 36 cells, were fabricated with chip sizes of 5 × 5 mm. They exhibited a blocking voltage of 500 V, on-state voltage of 2.3 V at a current of 10 A, and turn-off time of 0.5 µs at 150°C.     

Localized lifetime control in insulated-gate transistors by proton implantation

The application of localized carrier lifetime control to power devices is explored. A new type of power device, the insulated-gate transistor, was chosen for this study. Proton implantation was used as an agent of lifetime control by varying energy (1 to 3.8 MeV) and dose. Most of the proton damage in silicon, and therefore most of the lifetime reduction, occurs near the proton end-of-range, resulting in a localized band of low lifetime. Proton energy determines the depth at which the region of minimum lifetime is placed within the device structure. The effect of localized lifetime reduction on forward voltage, turn-off time, and leakage current was studied. The results lead to an understanding of the proper choice of depth at which to place a region of low lifetime, and illustrate the advantages of localization. With this choice, a significantly better tradeoff curve of forward voltage versus turn-off time is shown to be realized with proton implantation compared to the unlocalized but common technique of electron irradiation.     

Hot-implantation of nitrogen donors into p- type α-SiC and characterization of n+-p junction

N⁺ implantation into p-type a-SiC (6H-SiC, 4H-SiC) epilayers at elevated temperatures was investigated and compared with implantation at room temperature (RT). When the implant dose exceeded 4 × 10₁₅ cm₋₂, a complete amorphous layer was formed in RT implantation and severe damage remained even after post implantation annealing at 1500°C. By employing hot implantation at 500~800°C, the formation of a complete amorphous layer was suppressed and the residual damage after annealing was significantly reduced. For implant doses higher than 10¹⁵ cm⁻², the sheet resistance of implanted layers was much reduced by hot implantation. The lowest sheet resistance of 542Ω/ was obtained by implantation at 500 ~ 800°C with a 4 × 10¹⁵ cm⁻² dose. Characterization of n⁺-p junctions fabricated by N⁺ implantation into p-type epilayers was carried out in detail. The net doping concentration in the region close to the junction showed a linearly graded profile. The forward current was clearly divided into two components of diffusion and recombination. A high breakdown voltage of 615 ∼ 810V, that is almost an ideal value, was obtained, even if the implant dose exceeded 10¹⁵ cm⁻². By employing hot implantation at 800°C, the reverse leakage current was significantly reduced.     

Polymer Photovoltaic Cells Based on Solution‐Processable Graphene and P3HT

A soluble graphene, which has a one‐atom thickness and a two‐dimensional structure, is blended with poly(3‐hexylthiophene) (P3HT) and used as the active layer in bulk heterojunction (BHJ) polymer photovoltaic cells. Adding graphene to the P3HT induces a great quenching of the photoluminescence of the P3HT, indicating a strong electron/energy transfer from the P3HT to the graphene. In the photovoltaic devices with an ITO/PEDOT:PSS/P3HT:graphene/LiF/Al structure, the device efficiency increases first and then decreases with the increase in the graphene content. The device containing only 10 wt % of graphene shows the best performance with a power conversion efficiency of 1.1%, an open‐circuit voltage of 0.72 V, a short‐circuit current density of 4.0 mA cm⁻², and a fill factor of 0.38 under simulated AM1.5G conditions at 100 mW cm⁻² after an annealing treatment at 160 °C for 10 min. The annealing treatment at the appropriate temperature (160 °C, for example) greatly improves the device performance; however, an annealing at overgenerous conditions such as at 210 °C results in a decrease in the device efficiency (0.57%). The morphology investigation shows that better performance can be obtained with a moderate content of graphene, which keeps good dispersion and interconnection. The functionalized graphene, which is cheap, easily prepared, stable, and inert against the ambient conditions, is expected to be a competitive candidate for the acceptor material in organic photovoltaic applications.     

Rapid thermal annealing of ion implanted cdte

Rapid thermal annealing of ion implantedn-type CdTe has been investigated. Samples were implanted with 60 keV Ar⁺ and As⁺ ions to a dose of 1 × 10¹⁴ cm⁻² and subjected to anneal sequences of 5-100s at temperatures of 350-650° C. Photoluminescence measurements have indicated that the implantation completely quenches the photoluminescence; however, anneals for only 5s at 350° C are sufficient to recover most of the features of the photoluminescence spectrum to that equivalent of unimplanted material. Luminescence spectral features associated with thermal annealing damage and substitutional As in inferred. Type conversion of the As⁺ implanted layer is observed and it has been shown that good diodes can be made, with the best behaviour resulting from a 5s anneal at 450° C. Research supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada     

A high-power gate-controlled switch (GCS) using new lifetime control method

A high-power gate-controlled switch (GCS) with high switching speed was developed using a new method for controlling minority-carrier lifetime where both iron and gold were doped into the device. An improved temperature dependence of the forward voltage drop of the device was obtained because each of the forward voltage drops determined by iron and gold has opposite temperature dependence. The lifetime was controlled reproducibly by two-step diffusion of lifetime killers, that is, iron diffusion at high temperature and gold diffusion at lower temperatures afterwards. The relation between the forward voltage drop and the lifetime was theoretically analyzed and the agreement between the theory and experimental results was fairly good. The GCS of 0.15-cm²active area has the ratings of blocking voltage of 1500 V, available turn-off current of 160 A, forward voltage drop of 3 V at anode current of 100 A, and turn-off gain of 9. The turnoff time and turn-on time of less than 2 µs could be obtained. Thedv/dtanddi/dtare 1000 V/µs and 500 A/µs, respectively. The operation of 50 kHz at 100 A/1000 V could be realized with the inductive load of 50 µH by the GCS. The SIPOS (SemiInsulating POlycrystalline-Silicon) passivation was applied to the GCS in order to obtain the high reliability.     

High performance sol–gel spin-coated titanium dioxide dielectric based MOS structures

High-κ TiO₂ thin films have been fabricated using cost effective sol–gel and spin-coating technique on p-Si (100) wafer. Plasma activation process was used for better adhesion between TiO₂ films and Si. The influence of annealing temperature on the structure-electrical properties of titania films were investigated in detail. Both XRD and Raman studies indicate that the anatase phase crystallizes at 400 °C, retaining its structural integrity up to 1000 °C. The thickness of the deposited films did not vary significantly with the annealing temperature, although the refractive index and the RMS roughness enhanced considerably, accompanied by a decrease in porosity. For electrical measurements, the films were integrated in metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) structure. The electrical measurements evoke a temperature dependent dielectric constant with low leakage current density. The Capacitance–voltage (C–V) characteristics of the films annealed at 400 °C exhibited a high value of dielectric constant (~34). Further, frequency dependent C–V measurements showed a huge dispersion in accumulation capacitance due to the presence of TiO₂/Si interface states and dielectric polarization, was found to follow power law dependence on frequency (with exponent ‘s’=0.85). A low leakage current density of 3.6×10⁻⁷ A/cm² at 1 V was observed for the films annealed at 600 °C. The results of structure-electrical properties suggest that the deposition of titania by wet chemical method is more attractive and cost-effective for production of high-κ materials compared to other advanced deposition techniques such as sputtering, MBE, MOCVD and ALD. The results also suggest that the high value of dielectric constant ‘κ‘ obtained at low processing temperature expands its scope as a potential dielectric layer in MOS device technology.     

Low-temperature processing of shallow junctions using epitaxial and polycrystalline CoSi2

Cobalt disilicide is grown epitaxially on (100) Si from a 15 nm Co/2 nm Ti bilayer by rapid thermal annealing (RTA) at 900°C. Polycrystalline CoSi₂ is grown on (100) Si using a 15 nm Co layer and the same annealing condition. Silicide/p⁺-Si/n-Si diodes are made using the silicide as dopant source:¹¹B⁺ ions are implanted at 3.5–7.5 kV and activated by RTA at 600–900°C. Shallow junctions with total junction depth (silicide plus p⁺ region) measured by high-resolution secondaryion mass spectroscopy of 100 nm are fabricated. Areal leakage current densities of 13 nA/cm² and 2 nA/cm² at a reverse bias of -5V are obtained for the epitaxial silicide and polycrystalline silicide junctions, respectively, after 700°C post-implant annealing.     

Electron irradiation of field-controlled thyristors

The influence of 3-MeV electron irradiation upon the characteristics of asymmetrical field-controlled thyristors has been examined for fluences of up to 16 Mrad. In addition to the lifetime reduction due to the radiation damage, carrier removal effects have also been observed in the very lightly doped n-base region of these devices. The leakage current, even after radiation at the highest fluenee, is not significantly increased and the blocking characteristies of these devices are not degraded. In fact, a small improvement in the blocking gain has been observed at low gate voltages. The electron irradiation has been found to increase the forward voltage drop during current conduction and to reduce the forced gate turn-off time. Gate turn-off times of less than 500 ns have been achieved by irradiation with a fluence of 16 Mrad. However, this is accompanied by a large increase in the forward voltage drop. Tradeoff curves between the forward voltage drop and the gate turn-off time have been obtained. From these curves, it has been determined that gate turnoff times of 1 µs can be obtained without a significant increase in the forward voltage drop for devices capable of blocking up to 600 V.     

Impurity induced disordering of GaInAs quantum wells with barriers of AlGaInAs or of GaInAsP

Impurity induced disordering of GaInAs quantum well structures with barriers of AlGaInAs and of GaInAsP has been investigated using boron and fluorine. The impurities were introduced by ion implantation followed by thermal annealing. Annealing unimplanted P-based quaternary material at temperatures greater than 500° C caused a blue shift of the exciton peak. At annealing temperatures greater than 650° C red shifts in the exciton peak of unimplanted Al-based quaternary material were observed. Boron implantation caused small blue shifts of the exciton peak in both material systems at low annealing temperatures. Much larger blue shifts were observed in the fluorine implanted samples.     

1200 V 4H-SiC Bipolar Junction Transistors with A Record β of 70

A common current gain of 70 has been achieved in 4H-SiC bipolar junction transistors (BJTs) at room temperature, which is the highest among those reported. BJTs having an active area of 4 mm × 4 mm exhibit a specific on-resistance of 6.3 mΩ cm² at 25°C, which increases to 17.4 mΩ cm² at 250°C. BV_CEO (the breakdown voltage from collector to emitter with open base) and BV_CBO (the breakdown voltage from collector to base with open emitter) of 1200 V were observed at <5 μA leakage currents at all temperatures up to 250°C. Dynamic characteristics were measured using the IXYS RF/Directed Energy IXDD415 gate driver evaluation board to drive the BJT. A collector current (I _C) rise time at turn-on of 32 ns was measured with a 1.6 A gate current provided to support the collector current of 63 A. An I _C fall time at turn-off of 16 ns was achieved.     

Some properties of ion-implanted p−n junctions in silicon

Diodes have been made by implantation of boron or gallium ions in n-type, and phosphorus ions in p-type silicon. The doses range from 5 × 10¹² to 10¹⁵ ions/cm², and the energies from 20 to 70 keV. In all diodes the reverse current shows a sharp recovery step upon annealing at 500–600°C. The reverse current after this annealing is typically of the order of 1 nA/cm² at 1 V reverse bias. To overcome the problem of low breakdown voltages usually found for implanted junctions, methods have been developed to enlarge the effective radius of curvature at the edge of the implanted junction. In a planar process with oxide masking, breakdown voltages of 150 V for 3 Ωcm or 1500 V for 300 Ωcm silicon are obtained. This is done by implanting the ions through a tapered oxide, where the oxide walls make an angle of only 3–5° with the silicon surface. The junction depth in this case is 0.4 μm.Another method uses a mask, placed free in front of the slice. Slice and mask rotate during implantation. In this way, a breakdown voltage of 2700 V is obtained with 300 Ωcm silicon.     

Porphyrin Helical Nanochannel-Assembled Polybenzimidazole Membranes Doped with Phosphoric Acid for Fuel Cells Operating in a Temperature Range of 25–200 °C

High-temperature proton-exchange membrane fuel cells (HT-PEMFCs) fabricated with phosphoric acid (PA)-doped polybenzimidazole (PBI) show apparent technical advantages. In practical automotive applications, achieving cold start-up capability is crucial. In this work, a kind of branched block proton exchange membrane (PEM) based on PBI with a low content of porphyrin ring (<1 mol.%) is reported as a branched monomer. Self-assembly into high-density helical nanochannels under the synergistic effect of phase separation and porphyrin π−π stacking, thus the PEM can maintain a high level of PA doping. Specifically, the PA/1.8TCPP-BrPy-OPBI membrane shows a proton conductivity of 0.169 and 0.071 S cm⁻¹, as well as an H₂-O₂ fuel cell peak power density of 1077 and 357 mW cm⁻² at 180 and 80 °C without humidification and backpressure, respectively. The membrane electrode assembly (MEA) can exhibit good fuel cell stability, with a voltage decay rate of only 7.0 µV h⁻¹ at 80 °C. Furthermore, it maintains a peak power density of 93% even after 150 start-up/shut-down cycles at 25 °C. This work expands the operating temperature range of conventional PBI membranes between 25 and 200 °C and thus provides a novel strategy for high-performance PBI-based HT-PEMFCs.     

Low‐Temperature,Nontoxic Water‐Induced Metal‐Oxide Thin Films and Their Application in Thin‐Film Transistors

Here, a simple, nontoxic, and inexpensive “water‐inducement” technique for the fabrication of oxide thin films at low annealing temperatures is reported. For water‐induced (WI) precursor solution, the solvent is composed of water without additional organic additives and catalysts. The thermogravimetric analysis indicates that the annealing temperature can be lowered by prolonging the annealing time. A systematic study is carried out to reveal the annealing condition dependence on the performance of the thin‐film transistors (TFTs). The WI indium‐zinc oxide (IZO) TFT integrated on SiO₂ dielectric, annealed at 300 °C for 2 h, exhibits a saturation mobility of 3.35 cm² V^?1 s^?1 and an on‐to‐off current ratio of ≈10⁸. Interestingly, through prolonging the annealing time to 4 h, the electrical parameters of IZO TFTs annealed at 230 °C are comparable with the TFTs annealed at 300 °C. Finally, fully WI IZO TFT based on YO_x dielectric is integrated and investigated. This TFT device can be regarded as “green electronics” in a true sense, because no organic‐related additives are used during the whole device fabrication process. The as‐fabricated IZO/YO_x TFT exhibits excellent electron transport characteristics with low operating voltage (≈1.5 V), small subthreshold swing voltage of 65 mV dec^?1 and the mobility in excess of 25 cm² V^?1 s^?1.     

High-current,low-forward-drop JBS power rectifiers

The junction-barrier-controlled Schottky (JBS) rectifier is a Schottky rectifier with a p-n junction grid structure integrated into the device structure to improve its reverse blocking characteristics. This paper reports the development of large area (0.5 cm²), 30 V, JBS rectifiers capable of handling over 25 A of forward current while operating at up to 125°C with good reverse blocking characteristics. Trade-off curves between forward voltage drop and reverse leakage current are introduced to allow optimization of these devices.     

Pre-Protonated Vanadium Hexacyanoferrate for High Energy-Power and Anti-Freezing Proton Batteries

Proton batteries have been considered as an innovative energy storage technology owing to their high safety and cost-effectiveness. However, the development of fast-charging proton batteries with high energy/power density is greatly limited by feasible material selection. Here, the pre-protonated vanadium hexacyanoferrate (H-VHCF) is developed as a proton cathode material to alleviate the capacity loss of proton-free electrode materials during electrochemical tests. The pre-protonation process realizes fast and long-distance transport of protons by shortening diffusion path and reducing migration barriers. Benefitting from the enhanced hydrogen bonding network combined with dual redox reactions of V and Fe in protonated H-VHCF cathode, a high energy density of 74 Wh kg⁻¹ at 1.1 kW kg⁻¹, and a maximum power density of 54 kW kg⁻¹ at 65 Wh kg⁻¹ is achieved for the asymmetric proton batteries coupling with MoO₃/MXene anode. Proton transport and double oxidation-reduction center are verified by theoretical calculations and ex situ experimental measurements. Considering the anti-freezing availability of proton batteries, 82.5% of its initial capacity is maintained after 10000 cycles under −40 °C at 0.5 A g⁻¹. As a proof-of-concept, flexible device fabricated by optimized electrodes and hydrogel electrolytes can power up a light-emitting diode even under a bent state.     

Temperature dependence of field-controlled thyristor characteristics

The dependence of the characteristics of field-controlled thyristors upon the ambient temperature has been examined in the range of -30 to 200°C. Unlike conventional thyristors, these devices have been found to continue to exhibit forward blocking capability up to the highest measurement temperature (200°C). In fact, it is shown here that the forward blocking capability as well as the blocking gain improve with increasing temperature with the usual scaling of the leakage current for power devices. The reverse blocking capability is also retained. The forward voltage drop of the device in the conducting state decreases with increasing temperature. This behavior is shown to be similar to that of conventional rectifiers and thyristors operated at high injection levels. Further, the force gate turn-off time of the devices has been found to increase with increasing temperature. This has been correlated with a measured increase in the minority-carrier lifetime. The results of this study demonstrate that field-controlled thyristors are capable of being operated at higher temperatures than conventional thyristors.