FerroHEMTs: High-Current and High-Speed All-Epitaxial AlScN/GaN Ferroelectric Transistors

We report the first observation of ferroelectric gating in AlScN barrier wide-bandgap nitride transistors. These FerroHEMT devices realized by direct epitaxial growth represent a new class of ferroelectric transistors in which the semiconductor is itself polar, and the crystalline ferroelectric barr...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:arXiv.org 2023-02
Main Authors: Casamento, J, Nomoto, K, Nguyen, T S, Lee, H, Savant, C, L Li, Hickman, A, Maeda, T, Encomendero, J, Gund, V, Lal, A, Hwang, J C M, Xing, H G, Jena, D
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Digital electronics
Electronics
Epitaxial growth
Ferroelectric materials
Ferroelectricity
Gallium nitrides
Hysteresis
Lattice matching
Semiconductor devices
Substrates
Transistors
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Summary:We report the first observation of ferroelectric gating in AlScN barrier wide-bandgap nitride transistors. These FerroHEMT devices realized by direct epitaxial growth represent a new class of ferroelectric transistors in which the semiconductor is itself polar, and the crystalline ferroelectric barrier is lattice-matched to the substrate. The FerroHEMTs reported here use the thinnest nitride high K and ferroelectric barriers to date to deliver the highest on currents at 4 A/mm, and highest speed AlScN transistors with fmax larger than 150 GHz observed in any ferroelectric transistor. The FerroHEMTs exhibit hysteretic Id Vgs loops with subthreshold slopes below the Boltzmann limit. A control AlN barrier HEMT exhibits neither hysteretic, nor sub Boltzmann behavior. While these results introduce the first epitaxial high K and ferroelectric barrier technology to RF and mm wave electronics, they are also of interest as a new material platform for combining memory and logic functionalities in digital electronics.
ISSN:2331-8422
DOI:10.48550/arxiv.2302.14209