Investigation of traps in AlGaN/GaN HEMTs on silicon substrate

in Physica Status Solidi C. Current Topics in Solid State Physics (2003), (7), 2360-2363

Deep levels in AlGaN/GaN heterostructures are known to be responsible for trapping processes like current collapse or dispersion. In order to investigate these processes we performed different ... [more ▼]

Deep levels in AlGaN/GaN heterostructures are known to be responsible for trapping processes like current collapse or dispersion. In order to investigate these processes we performed different measurements on HEMTs fabricated with heterostructures grown on silicon substrate. First by photoionization spectroscopy we found three different traps with activation energies of about 2.1 eV, 2.9 eV and 3.2 eV. Secondly, the temperature dependent relaxation of the drain current was investigated by the backgating current deep level transient spectroscopy (DLTS) method. Hereby we detected majority and minority carrier traps in the GaN buffer at the energies EV + 0.41 eV and EC – 0.55 eV, respectively. The latter energy can be attributed to the well known “E2” level in GaN. [less ▲]

Photoionization spectroscopy of traps in doped and undoped AlGaN/GaN HEMTs

in Physica Status Solidi C. Current Topics in Solid State Physics (2002), (1), 82-85

Deep-level defects and surface states are supposed to be responsible for the limitation of AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility transistor (HEMT) performance. In order to investigate the influence of these ... [more ▼]

Deep-level defects and surface states are supposed to be responsible for the limitation of AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility transistor (HEMT) performance. In order to investigate the influence of these traps, photoionization spectroscopy was used to study doped and undoped HEMTs grown on sapphire in different metalorganic vapour-phase epitaxy reactors. This measurement technique is based on the optical reversion of the current collapse and it allows one to determine photoionization cross-sections of the participating traps. For doped and undoped HEMTs nearly the same two defect levels with excitation energies of 3.2 eV and 2.9 eV were determined. By varying the source–gate voltage it was found that the photoionization cross-section is reduced for positive gate bias, i.e. the virtual gate on the gate–drain access region is partially neutralized due to the removal of trapped electrons from surface states. [less ▲]

Investigations on the influence of traps in AlGaN/GaN HEMTs

in EDMO (2001)