The Impact of Hot Carrier Injection-Induced Device Degradation for Lower-Power FinFETs

Yu Lin Chen, Wen Kuan Yeh, Heng Tung Hsu, Ke Horng Chen, Der Hsien Lien, Wen Chin Lin, Tien Han Yu, Yu Sheng Chiu, D. Godwinraj, D. Godfrey, Chien Hung Wu*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

1 Scopus citations

Abstract

The impact of hot carrier injection (HCI) on the performance of standard and low-VT FinFETs are investigated and benchmarked with each other. For this investigation, these FinFETs were fabricated with various gate lengths (L) from 16 to 36 nm. HCI-induced transconductance degradation in standard devices for gate length variations of 36 nm down to 16 nm was 75%, while it was 35% for low-VT devices. Similarly, the degradation of threshold voltage in standard devices for gate length variations of 36 nm down to 16 nm was 39%, while it was 36% for low-VT device. In this work, as the device is subject to HCI, we found that: (1) short-channel devices cause severe degradation on the threshold voltage and transconductance (gm) compared to long-channel devices, owing to the higher electric field for short-channel devices at the gate edge, (2) standard devices exhibit a more stable threshold voltage than that of low-VT power devices, since the TiN barrier layer prevents Al atom diffusion into the HfO2 layer, and (3) the transconductance efficiency of standard devices is better than that of low-VT power devices. Further, the lower-VT devices show lower transconductance degradation than standard devices. However, the transconductance degradation of the long-channel standard and low-VT devices are the same. Compared to short-channel low-VT devices, extended-channel standard devices are more immune to the HCI effect.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1391-1399
Number of pages9
JournalJournal of Electronic Materials
Volume52
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - Feb 2023

Keywords

  • FinFETs
  • hot carrier injection
  • low-power device
  • threshold voltage
  • transconductance

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