High speed p-type SiGe modulation-doped field-effect transistors

We report on the fabrication and characterization of high-speed p-type modulation-doped field-effect transistors (MODFETs) with 0.7-μm and 1-μm gate-lengths having unity current-gain cut-off frequencies (f_T) of 9.5 GHz and 5.3 GHz, respectively. The devices were fabricated on a high hole mobility SiGe heterostructure grown by ultra-high-vacuum chemical vapor deposition (UHV-CVD). The dc maximum extrinsic transconductance (g_m) is 105 mS/mm (205 mS/mm) at room temperature (77 K) for the 0.7-μm gate length devices. The fabricated devices show good pinch-off characteristics and have a very low gate leakage current of a few μA/mm at room temperature and a few nA/mm at 77 K     

Cryogenic temperature performance of modulation-doped field-effect transistors

Reports S-parameter measurements of AlInAs/GaInAs/InP modulation-doped field-effect transistors (MODFETs) at cryogenic temperatures. The current gain at 80 K is 3 dB higher than at 300 K, and the current gain cutoff frequency f/sub T/ increases from 32 GHz at 300 K, to 42 GHz at 80 K, which is the first observation of higher f/sub T/ by direct measurement.<>     

Ultra-high speed modulation-doped field-effect transistors: atutorial review

A tutorial review on the modulation-doped field-effect transistor (MODFET) and its application to ultra-low-noise, medium-power, and ultra-wide-band traveling-wave amplifiers as well as ultra-high-speed digital logic circuits is presented. It is believed that with further advances in material growth and device scaling significant improvements in cutoff frequencies, switching speed, noise, and power will be achieved in the near future     

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 InGaAs/AlGaAs pseudomorphic modulation-doped field-effect transistors

Pseudomorphic In0.15Ga0.85As/Al0.15Ga0.85As modulation-doped field effect transistors (MODFET's) exhibiting extremely good dc characteristics have been successfully fabricated, dc transconductance in these strained-layer structures of 270 mS/mm were measured for 1-µm gate, normally-on devices at 300 K. Maximum drain current levels are 290 mA/mm, with excellent pinch-off and saturation characteristics. The transconductance increased to 360 mS/mm at 77 K while no persistent photoconductivity or drain collapse was observed. Preliminary microwave results indicate a 300-K current gain cutoff frequency of about 20 GHz. These results are equivalent to the best GaAs/AlGaAs MODFET results and are due in part to the improved transport properties and carrier confinement in the InGaAs quantum well.     

Characterization of InGaAs/AlGaAs pseudomorphic modulation-doped field-effect transistors

High-performance pseudomorphic InyGa1-yAs/Al0.15- Ga0.85As (0.05 le y le 0.2) MODFET's grown by MBE have been characterized at dc (300 and 77 K) and RF frequencies. Transconductances as high as 310 and 380 mS/mm and drain currents as high as 290 and 310 mA/mm were obtained at 300 and 77 K, respectively, for 1-µm gate lengths and 3-µm source-drain spacing devices. Lack of persistent trapping effects,I-Vcollapse, and threshold voltage shifts observed with these devices are attributed to the use of low mole fraction AlxGa1-xAs while still maintaining 2DEG concentrations of about 1.3 × 10¹²cm^-2. Detailed microwave S-parameter measurements indicate a current gain cut-off frequency Of 24.5 GHz Wheny = 0.20, which is as much as 100 percent better than similar GaAs/AlGaAs MODFET structures, and a maximum frequency of oscillation of 40 GHz. These superior results are in part due to the higher electron velocity of InGaAs as compared with GaAs. Velocity field measurement performed up to 3 kV/cm using the magnetoresistance method indicates an electron saturation velocity of greater than 1.7 × 10⁷cm/s at 77 K fory = 0.15, which is 20 percent higher than GaAs/AlGaAs MODFET's of similar structure.     

Gallium arsenide self-aligned gate field-effect transistors

A technique is described for automatically aligning the gate contact of a gallium arsenide microwave-frequency Schottky-barrier field-effect transistor between the source and drain contacts. This technique consists of etching part of the epitaxial gallium arsenide layer from beneath the edge of the source and drain contacts and using the resulting overhang as an evaporation mask for the gate contact metal. Microwave measurements were made on a device fabricated in this manner with a 4-µ gate length. Maximum available gain measurements yield 16 dB at 2 GHz falling off at 6 dB/octave to a cutoff frequency of 11 GHz.     

Low-frequency noise characteristics of AlInAs/GaInAs modulation-doped field-effect transistors

The output noise voltage of AlInAs/GaInAs MODFETs grown by both MOCVD and MBE was measured at frequencies from 1 MHz to 1.5 GHz under different bias conditions for the first time. For frequencies below 500 MHz the noise voltage showed a 1/f dependence with a corner frequency around 200 MHz. The low-frequency noise was larger at the bias conditions giving higher transconductance.<>     

Subthreshold slope for insulated gate field-effect transistors

An explicit expression has been derived for the subthreshold slope of an insulated gate field-effect transistor. This expression is used to explore the influence of surface band-bending, gate insulator thickness, substrate doping, substrate bias, and temperature.     

Subthreshold design considerations for insulated gate field-effect transistors

A knowledge of subthreshold behavior in an insulated gate field-effect transistor is important for circuits with low leakage specifications. This paper discusses the effect of drain voltage on the subthreshold region as the channel length becomes shorter, the effect of substrate bias on both the shift in and the slope of the subthreshold curves, and the effect of temperature on the subthreshold current characteristics. It is shown that all these effects can be incorporated into a simple one-dimensional model.     

Inverted GaAs/AlGaAs modulation-doped field-effect transistors with extremely high transconductances

Inverted GaAs/AsGaAs MODFET's with transconductances as high as 1810 mS/mm at 77 K and 1180 mS/mm at 300 K are fabricated using a self-aligned process. The devices have the gate-heterojunction interface spacing of only 100 Å, and the observed values of the transconductance are limited primarily by the source series resistance and by the gate current. The MODFET characteristics are interpreted using the charge control velocity saturation model which takes into account the gate current. The obtained results show a great potential of inverted MODFET's for ultrahigh-speed applications.     

Ion-implanted threshold tailoring for insulated gate field-effect transistors

This paper develops a general threshold equation for long-channel insulated gate field-effect transistors which accounts for the effects of ion-implant profiles used in threshold tailoring. Although any integrable function used to describe the nonuniform doping will yield an analytical expression for threshold, a Gaussian function is chosen because it accurately describes the implanted profile following proper annealing, regardless of subsequent high-temperature steps during fabrication. Most profiles of interest are quasi-neutral, i.e., the spatial dependence of the majority carriers in the undepleted bulk is adequately described by the doping profile, but the threshold equation is shown to be an excellent approximation for non quasi-neutral profiles as well. Comparison with experimental results show the analytical expression to be in good agreement with data over a wide range of implant conditions and starting substrate resistivity.     

Anisotype, enhancement-mode, heterojunction gate field-effect transistors

Anisotype, p/sup +/-GaAs/n-In/sub 0.15/Ga/sub 0.85/As heterojunction field-effect transistors, grown by molecular beam epitaxy and fabricated by a self-aligned process, have been investigated for digital logic applications. Peak transconductance of 411 mS/mm and a K-value of 292 mA/V/sup 2//mm were obtained for an enhancement-mode device with gate length of 1 mu m. Preliminary analysis of a nonisolated device leads to a cut off frequency of 17.5 GHz.<>     

New mechanism of gate current in heterostructure insulated gate field-effect transistors

We demonstrate that the mechanism responsible for the gate current in heterostructure insulated gate field-effect transistors (HIGFET's) changes drastically at the gate voltage equal to the threshold voltage. At the gate voltages below the threshold voltage the gate current is determined by the thermionic emission over the Schottky barrier at high temperatures and by the thermionic field emission at low temperatures. Above the threshold the gate current is determined by the new mechanism which is the thermionic emission over the conduction band discontinuity at high temperatures and by tunneling through the AlGaAs layer at low temperatures. We present the model describing the gate current in the entire range of the gate voltages and device temperatures.     

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     

Self-aligned modulation-doped (Al,Ga)As/GaAs field-effect transistors

The first modulation-doped (Al,Ga)As/GaAs field-effect transistors (MODFET's) have been fabricated using a self-aligned ion-implantation process. Measured extrinsic transconductances of 190 mS/mm were achieved at 300 K with source resistances of 1 Ω.mm. The highest currents yet reported for such device structures, in excess of 350 mA/mm, were obtained. A value of the maximum two-dimensional electron gas concentration of nearly 1.2 × 10¹²cm^-2was obtained from an analysis of the FET drain current-voltage characteristics using the charge-control model. These results hold promise for the practical fabrication of very high speed integrated circuits based on MODFET's, using a completely planar self-aligned ion-implantation process.     

Ultra-thin polymer gate dielectrics for top-gate polymer field-effect transistors

We have demonstrated top-gate polymer field-effect transistors (FETs) with ultra-thin (30–50 nm), room-temperature crosslinkable polymer gate dielectrics based on blending an insulating base polymer such as poly(methyl methacrylate) with an organosilane crosslinking agent, 1,6-bis(trichlorosilyl)hexane. The top-gate polymer transistors with thin gate dielectrics were operated at gate voltages less than ?8 V with a relatively high dielectric breakdown strength (>3 MV/cm) and a low leakage current (10–100 nA/mm² at 2 MV/cm). The yield of thin gate dielectrics in top-gate polymer FETs is correlated with the roughness of underlying semiconducting polymer film. High mobilities of 0.1–0.2 cm²/V s and on and off state current ratios of 10⁴ were achieved with the high performance semiconducting polymer, poly(2,5-bis(3-alkylthiophen-2yl)thieno[3,2-b]thiophene.     

CW oscillation characteristics of GaAs Schottky-barrier gate field-effect transistors

The CW oscillation characteristics of GaAs Schottky-barrier gate FET's have been examined at 10 GHz. The maximum output power of 41.2 mW and the maximum efficiency of 15.6 percent have been obtained for the GaAs FET with a gate length of 1.5 µm and an electrode width of 300 µm. The experimental results have shown that the GaAs FET possesses promising features for an oscillator application as well as an amplifier application.     

Prediction of magnetic flux-controlled gate voltage insuperconducting field-effect transistors

The undirectional model to the superconducting field-effect transistor (SFET) is shown to be thermodynamically unsound. A gate voltage which is controlled by the magnetic flux difference in a Josephson weak link is predicted by energy arguments. For a passive SFET model to be consistent with recent experimental observations of a charge-controlled critical current, a back-reaction from the DC drain-to-source flux (phase difference) to the DC gate voltage is required. As this effect is important in large devices and occurs at V_DS=0, it does not appear to be directly related to charge-space energy bands or quasiparticle interference