Comparison of dc performance of Pt/Ti/Au- and Ni/Au-Gated AlGaN/GaN High Electron Mobility Transistors

Journal Article · Sat Jan 01 00:00:00 EST 2011 · Applied Physics Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1116/1.3607601· OSTI ID:1018607

Liu, L. ^[1]; Lo, C. F. ^[2]; Kang, Tsung Sheng ^[1]; Pearton, S. J. ^[2]; Kravchenko, Ivan I ^[3]; Laboutin, O. ^[4]; Johnson, Wayne J. ^[4]; Ren, F. ^[2]

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1. University of Florida, Gainesville
2. University of Florida
3. ORNL
4. Kopin Corporation, Taunton, MA

We have demonstrated significant improvements of AlGaN/GaN High Electron Mobility Transistors (HEMTs) dc performance by employing Pt/Ti/Au instead of the conventional Ni/Au gate metallization. During off-state bias stressing, the typical critical voltage for HEMTs with Ni/Au gate metallization was ~ -45 to -65V. By sharp contrast, no critical voltage was observed for HEMTs with Pt/Ti/Au gate metallization, even up to -100V, which was the instrumental limitation in this experiment. After the off-state stressing, the drain current of Ni/Au gated-HEMTs decreased by~ 15%. For the Pt-gate HEMTs, no degradation of the drain current occurred and there were minimal changes in the Schottky gate characteristics for both forward and reverse bias conditions. The HEMTs with Pt/Ti/Au metallization showed an excellent drain on/off current ratio of 1.5 108. The on/off drain current ratio of Ni-gated HEMTs was dependent on the drain bias voltage and ranged from 1.2 107 at Vds=5V and 6 105

• Research Organization: Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences (CNMS)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Science (SC)
• DOE Contract Number: DE-AC05-00OR22725
• OSTI ID: 1018607
• Journal Information: Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 29, Issue 4; ISSN 1071-1023
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
ELECTRON MOBILITY
LEAKAGE CURRENT
PERFORMANCE
TRANSISTORS