A possible scaling limit for enhancement-mode GaAs MESFETs in DCFLcircuits

A possible scaling limit for ion-implanted GaAs MESFETs with buried p-layer LDD structure has been numerically investigated. A Schottky-contact model with a thin interfacial layer and interface states was used to simulate the Schottky-barrier height of a scaled-down MESFETs. When enhancement-mode MESFETs in direct-coupled FET logic (DCFL) circuits are scaled down, the gate length can be reduced to 0.21 μm at an interface-state density of 6.6×10¹² cm^-2·eV^-1, when the barrier height is greater than 0.6 V, the threshold voltage is less than 0.1 V, and the channel aspect ratio is 8     

GaAs 10 bit DAC的抗辐射设计和实验

通过分析砷化镓(GaAs)器件的电离辐射剂量率辐照机理和效应,结合电路结构,描述了砷化镓10 bit数模转换器(DAC)的电离辐射剂量率辐射效应、抗辐射设计和辐照实验。在电路设计上,10 bit DAC由两个5 bit DAC组成,通过芯片内部合成10 bit DAC,有效降低了芯片面积和制造工艺难度;通过分析电路的电离辐射剂量率辐射效应,针对敏感电路进行局部电路的抗辐射设计,提高电路抗辐射能力;结合实验条件和器件引线分布,设计合理的辐照实验方案,开发辐照实验电路板,进行辐照实验,获得科学的实验结果,验证电路的抗辐射能力。实验结果表明该数模转换器能够抗3×1011rad(Si)/s剂量率的瞬时辐照。     

High-speed DCFL circuits with very shallow junction GaAs JFETs

High-speed DCFL (direct-coupled FET logic) circuits implemented with advanced GaAs enhancement-mode J-FETs are discussed. A divide-by-four static frequency divider operates at up to 6 GHz with a power consumption of 20 mW/flip-flop. A high channel concentration of more than 1×10¹⁸ cm^-3 together with a very shallow junction depth of less than 30 nm for the p⁺-gate results in a transconductance as high as 340 mS/mm at a gate length of 0.8 μm. Open-tube diffusion of Zn using diethylzinc and arsine makes it possible to control a very shallow p⁺-layer less than 10 nm thick. The propagation delay time, as measured with a ring oscillator, was 22 ps/gate with a power consumption of 0.42 mW/gate     

⟨110⟩-oriented GaAs MESFETs

GaAs metal semiconductor field-effect transistors (MESFETs) have been successfully fabricated on molecular-beam epitaxial (MBE) films grown on the off-axis (110) GaAs substrate. The (110) substrates were tilted 6° toward the (111) Ga face in order to produce device quality two-dimensional MBE growth. Following the growth of a 0.4-μm undoped GaAs buffer, a 0.18-μm GaAs channel with a doping density of 3.4×10¹⁷ cm^-3 and a 0.12-μm contact layer with a doping density of 2×10¹⁸ cm^-3, both doped with Si, were grown. MESFET devices fabricated on this material show very low-gate leakage current, low output conductance, and an extrinsic transconductance of 200 mS/mm. A unity-current-gain cutoff frequency of 23 GHz and a maximum frequency of oscillation of 56 GHz have been achieved. These (110) GaAs MESFETs have demonstrated their potential for high-speed digital circuits as well as microwave power FET applications     

High-performance, 0.1 μm InAlAs/InGaAs high electron mobilitytransistors on GaAs

This letter describes the material characterization and device test of InAlAs/InGaAs high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) grown on GaAs substrates with indium compositions and performance comparable to InP-based devices. This technology demonstrates the potential for lowered production cost of very high performance devices. The transistors were fabricated from material with room temperature channel electron mobilities and carrier concentrations of μ=10000 cm² /Vs, n=3.2×10¹² cm^-2 (In=53%) and μ=11800 cm²/Vs, n=2.8×10¹² cm^-2 (In=60%). A series of In=53%, 0.1×100 μm² and 0.1×50 μm² devices demonstrated extrinsic transconductance values greater than 1 S/mm with the best device reaching 1.074 S/mm. High-frequency testing of 0.1×50 μm² discrete HEMT's up to 40 GHz and fitting of a small signal equivalent circuit yielded an intrinsic transconductance (g_m,i) of 1.67 S/mm, with unity current gain frequency (f_T) of 150 GHz and a maximum frequency of oscillation (f_max) of 330 GHz. Transistors with In=60% exhibited an extrinsic g_m of 1.7 S/mm, which is the highest reported value for a GaAs based device     

GaAs integrated microwave circuits

GaAs has many desirable features that make it most useful for microwave and millimeter-wave integrated circuits. The process of selective epitaxial depositions of high purity single-crystal GaAs with various doping concentrations into semi-insulating GaAs substrates has been developed. These high-resistivity substrates (>10⁶ohm.cm) provide the electrical isolation between devices, eliminating the difficulties and deficiencies normally encountered in trying to obtain isolation with dielectrics, back-etching, p-n junctions, etc. This monolithic approach to integrated-circuits thus allows for improved microwave pedormance from the devices since parasitics are reduced to a minimum. Planar Gunn oscillators and Schottky barrier diodes have been fabricated for use in a completely monolithic integrated millimeter wave (94 GHz) receiving front end. The Gunn oscillators are made in a sandwich-type structure of three selective deposits whose carrier concentrations are approximately 10¹⁸-10¹⁵-10¹⁸cm^-3. The Schottky diodes consist of two deposits with concentrations of 10¹⁸and 10¹⁷cm^-3. The Schottky contact is formed by evaporating Mo-Au onto the 10¹⁷cm^-3deposits; all ohmic contacts are on the surface and are alloyed to the N⁺regions.     

Sub-half-micrometer width 2-D MESFET

Two-dimensional (2-D) MESFET's having sub-half-micron channel widths have been fabricated on double-δ-doped Al_0.24Ga _0.76As/In_0.18Ga_0.82As/GaAs heterostructures. The 2-D MESFET operates like a normal transistor at room temperature but uses very few electrons in the channel (about 500 at peak current and 5 at threshold). Also, the Narrow Channel Effect (NCE) and Drain-Induced Barrier Lowering (DIBL) (two effects which limit the minimum power operation in conventional devices) have been practically eliminated. The 0.4 micron wide device had an ON/OFF current ratio of 10⁵, a peak transconductance of 100 mS/mm, a threshold voltage of 0.3 V, a saturation voltage of 0.2 V, and a subthreshold ideality factor of 1.1. The 2-D MESFET DCFL inverter had a switching voltage and noise margin of 0.35 V and 0.26 V, respectively, at 0.8 V supply. These room temperature results suggest that the 2-D MESFET is an excellent candidate for future low power digital electronics applications     

Heterostructure devices using self-aligned p-type diffused ohmiccontacts

Describes the use of a p-type refractory ohmic contact in ohmic self-aligned devices. The contacts are based on self-aligned diffusion of zinc-doped tungsten film. The diffusion is nearly isotropic in the vicinity of silicon nitride sidewalls, allowing self-alignment of ohmic contacts with emitters and gates. Low-resistance contacts (<10^-6 Ω·cm²) are formed both to GaAs and GaAlAs, and the lifetime of the diffused region is superior to that obtained from implantation. Heterostructure bipolar transistors (HBTs) showing high current gains (⩾50 at 2×10³ A·cm^-2 and ⩾200 at 1×10⁵ A·cm^-2 with micrometer-sized emitter widths) and p-channel GaAs gate heterostructure field-effect transistors (HFETs) showing high transconductances (78 mS/mm at 2.2-μm gate length) have been fabricated using this contact     

Degradation mechanism of GaAs MESFET's

The degradation mechanism of X-band low-noise GaAs MESFET's is examined to obtain meaningful information on a common mode of failure. The devices tested have a half-micrometer gate (Au/ Mo) and source and drain ohmic contacts (Au/Ni/Au-Ge). Zero bias drain conductanceg_{D0}is considered as a representative parameter for degradation during aging. The major failure mode is an increase in series resistance of the ohmic contacts. The amount of degradation, decrease ing_{D0}, is proportional to the square root of aging time, and accompanied by an increase in minimum noise figureF_{min}. A degradation model based on the formation of a high-resistance layer between the ohmic metals and GaAs crystal by a diffusion reaction mechanism is proposed, resulting in excellent agreement between calculated and experimental results. Using ion-microspectroscopy analysis (IMA), diffusion of Ni into GaAs crystal is revealed. Mean time to failure (MTTF) is estimated to be 10⁷-10⁸h at channel temperature of 80°C with an increase inF_{min}of 0.5 dB as failure criterion.     

n-Channel AlSb/GaSb modulation-doped field-effect transistors

We report the first fabrication of a GaSb n-channel modulation-doped field-effect transistor (MODFET) grown by molecular beam epitaxy. The modulation-doped structure exhibits a room temperature Hall mobility of 3140 cm² V⁻¹ s⁻¹ and 77 K value of 16000 cm² V⁻¹ s⁻¹, with corresponding sheet carrier densities of 1.3 × 10¹² cm⁻² and 1.2 × 10¹² cm⁻². Devices with 1 μm gate length yield transconductances of 180 mS mm⁻¹ and output of 5 mS mm⁻¹ at 85 K. The device characteristics indicate that electron transport in the channel occurs primarily via the L-valley of GaSb above 85 K. The effective electron saturation velocity is estimated to be 0.9 × 10⁷ cm s⁻¹. Calculations show that a complementary circuit consisting of GaSb n- and p-channel MODFETs can provide at least two times improvement in performance over AlGaAs/GaAs complementary circuits.     

High-transconductance n-type Si/SiGe modulation-doped field-effecttransistors

The authors report on the fabrication and the resultant device characteristics of the first 0.25-μm gate-length field-effect transistor based on n-type modulation-doped Si/SiGe. Prepared using ultrahigh vacuum/chemical vapor deposition (UHV/CVD), the mobility and electron sheet charge density in the strained Si channel are 1500 (9500) cm²/V-s and 2.5×10¹² (1.5×10¹² ) cm^-2 at 300 K (77 K). At 77 K, the devices have a current and transconductance of 325 mA/mm and 600 mS/mm, respectively. These values far exceed those found in Si MESFETs and are comparable to the best results achieved in GaAs/AlGaAs modulation-doped transistors     

InGaAs metal-semiconductor field-effect transistor withLangmuir-Blodgett deposited gate structure

A high-transconductance n-channel, depletion-mode InGaAs metal-semiconductor field-effect transistor (MESFET) with a Langmuir-Blodgett deposited gate fabricated on organometallic chemical vapor deposition (OMCVD)-grown InGaAs lattice matched to InP is reported. The fabrication process is similar to epitaxial GaAs FET technology and is suitable for making optoelectronic integrated circuits (OEICs) for long-wavelength fiber-optic communications systems. Devices with 1-μm gate and 6×10¹⁶ channel doping achieved 162-mS/mm extrinsic transconductance and -1.8-V pinch-off voltage. The effective saturation velocity of electrons in the channel was measured to be between 3.5 and 3.9×10⁷ cm/s. The drain current ( I_dss), 300 mA/mm at V_ds=2.5 V, is the highest current capability reported for depletion-mode InGaAs MESFET devices with low pinch-off voltages     

Effect of natural radioactivity on optical fibers of underseacables

For undersea cables radiation doses between 2.5 and 25 rad are to be expected during a working life of 25 years. The majority of previous investigations of the radiation sensitivity of optical fibers, however, apply dose rates ≳1 rad/s and total dose values ≳3×10 ³ rad. The present paper describes ⁶⁰Co irradiations of a Ge-doped single mode fiber with dose rates between 10 ^-4 and 20 rad/s. Expected loss increase of an undersea optical fiber cable at 1550 nm wavelength with a temperature of 2°C is derived by three different methods. The most comfortable and reliable one, the `dose rate transformation method', yields, for example, a loss of only 0.0244 dB/100 km after 25 years of irradiation with a dose rate of 0.4 rad/s. This method could be the basis of a standard test procedure for the effect of natural radioactivity on optical fibers for very long repeaterless terrestrial and undersea cables     

Monolithic microwave amplifiers formed by ion implantation into LEC gallium arsenide substrates

A fabrication procedure for broad-band monolithic power GaAs integrated circuits has been demonstrated which includes formation of via holes through the 100-µm-thick GaAs substrate. A selective implant of²⁹Si ions into the GaAs substrate is used to dope the FET channel region to 1.2 × 10¹⁷cm^-3. The ohmic contacts are AuGe/Ni/Pt and the gates are Ti/Pt/Au. A 1.5-µm-thick circuit pattern is achieved using metal rejection assited by chlorobenzene treatment of AZ1350J photoresist. Using undoped Czochralski wafers of GaAs pulled from a pyrolytic boron nitride crucible, integrated amplifiers have been produced which deliver 28 ± 0.7 dBm from 5.7 to 11 GHz. These chips are 2 mm × 4.75 mm × 0.1 mm thick.     

High reliability InGaP/GaAs HBT

Excellent long term reliability InGaP/GaAs heterojunction bipolar transistors (HBT) grown by metalorganic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) are demonstrated. There were no device failures (T=10000 h) in a sample lot of ten devices (L=6.4 μm ×20 μm) under moderate current densities and high-temperature testing (J_c=25 kA/cm ², V_ce=2.0 V, Junction Temp =264°C). The dc current gain for large area devices (L=75 μm ×75 μm) at 1 kA/cm² at a base sheet resistance of 240 ohms/sq (4×10 ¹⁹ cm^-3@700 Å) was over 100. The dc current gain before reliability testing (L=6.4 μm ×10 μm) at 0.8 kA/cm² was 62. The dc current gain (0.8 kA/cm²) decreased to 57 after 10000 h of reliability testing. The devices showed an f_T=61 GHz and f_max=103 GHz. The reliability results are the highest ever achieved for InGaP/GaAs HBT and these results indicate the great potential of InGaP/GaAs HBT for numerous low- and high-frequency microwave circuit applications. The reliability improvements are probably due to the initial low base current at low current densities which result from the low surface recombination of InGaP and the high valence band discontinuity between InGaP and GaAs     

Advantages of metallic-amorphous-Silicon-gate FET's in GaAs LSI applications

A Schottky barrier as high as 1 V is obtained for contact between a ternary amorphous film, a-Si-Ge-B, and an n-type GaAs crystal. A metallic-amorphous-silicon-gate FET (MASFET) was made using the amorphous film as a gate contact. GaAs MASFET characteristics are superior to GaAs MESFET characteristics in application to LSI's with a DCFL configuration because the DCFL circuits with the GaAs MASFET's provide a logic level as high as 0.94 V and widen the circuit operation margin. Full operation is obtained from a 1 Kword × 2 bit SRAM with GaAs MASFET's, which is considered to be mainly due to the wide operation margin. The measured propagation delay time of the DCFL inverter is 34 ps at supply voltageV_{DD} = 1.5V and power consumption of 1.9 mW/gate.     

Microwave performance of ion-implanted InP JFETs

These devices have a planar structure with the channel and gate regions formed by the selective implantation of silicon and beryllium into an Fe-doped semi-insulating InP substrate. The nominal gate length is 2 μm with a channel doping of 10¹⁷ cm^-3 and thickness of 0.2 μm. The measured values of f_T and f_max are 10 and 23 GHz, respectively. Examination of the equivalent circuit parameters and their variation with bias led to the following conclusions: (a) a relatively gradual channel profile results in lower than desired transconductance, but also lower gate-to-channel capacitance; (b) although for the present devices, the gate length and transconductance are the primary performance-limiting parameters, the gate contact resistance also reduces the power gain significantly; (c) the output resistance appears lower than that of an equivalent GaAs MESFET, and requires a larger V_DS to reach its maximum value; and (d) a dipole layer forms and decouples the gate from the drain with a strength that falls between that of previously reported GaAs MESFETs and InP MESFETs     

All-GaAs/AlGaAs readout circuit for quantum-well infrared detectorfocal plane array

We report the fabrication and testing of an all-GaAs/AlGaAs hybrid readout circuit operating at 77 K designated for use with an GaAs/AlGaAs background-limited quantum-well infrared photodetector focal plane array (QWIP FPA). The circuit is based on a direct injection scheme, using specially designed cryogenic GaAs/AlGaAs MODFET's and a novel n⁺ -GaAs/AlGaAs/n⁺-GaAs semiconductor capacitor, which is able to store more than 15 000 electrons/μm² in a voltage range of ±0.7 V. The semiconductor capacitor shows little voltage dependence, small frequency dispersion, and no hysteresis. We have eliminated the problem of low-temperature degradation of the MODFET I-V characteristics and achieved very low gate leakage current of about 100 fA in the subthreshold regime. The MODFET electrical properties including input-referred noise voltage and subthreshold transconductance were thoroughly tested. Input-referred noise voltage as low as 0.5 μV/√Hz at 10 Hz was measured for a 2×30 μm² gate MODFET. We discuss further possibilities for monolithic integration of the developed devices     

The effect of channel boron implants on electron mobility inNMOSFET's

The Hall mobilities and Hall concentrations of channel electrons in boron-implanted NMOSFETs were measured at 77 and 300 K. At both temperatures, the mobilities were found to decrease with increasing implantation dose (10¹¹-10¹² cm^-2) only for electron concentrations <2×10¹² cm^-2, the effect being more pronounced at 77 K. It is suggested that the mobility degradation is mainly due to impurity scattering     

Radiation effects in transit-time microwave diodes

There has been considerable progress in the direct generation of microwave power using two-terminal semiconductor devices during the last decade. Permanent and transient radiation effects on bulk (Gunn and LSA) and junction (IMPATT, TRAPATT, and BARITT) transit-time microwave diodes are reviewed. Emphasis is placed upon relating the primary effects of radiation to the physics of device operation. The principal permanent damage is attributed to carrier removal effects, impairing the RF performance of bulk diodes below 10¹⁴neutrons/cm²and junction transit-time diodes at fluences near 10¹⁵neutrons/cm². The principal transient effect is the generation of free carriers by ionizing radiation, affecting the RF performance of bulk diodes above 10⁹rad/s and junction transit-time diodes at dose rates near 10⁸rad/s.