Impact of proton irradiation on dc performance of AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility transistors

Lu Liu, Camilo Velez Cuervo, Yuyin Xi, Fan Ren, Stephen J. Pearton, Hong Yeol Kim, Jihyun Kim, Ivan I. Kravchenko

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

32 Scopus citations

Abstract

The effects of high energy proton irradiation dose on dc performance as well as critical voltage of the drain-voltage step-stress of AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) were investigated to evaluate the feasibility of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs for space applications, which need to stand a variety of irradiations. The HEMTs were irradiated with protons at a fixed energy of 5 MeV and doses ranging from 109 to 2×10 14cm-2. For the dc characteristics, there was only minimal degradation of saturation drain current (IDSS), transconductance (gm), electron mobility, and sheet carrier concentration at doses below 2×1013cm-2, while the reduction of these parameters were 15%, 9%, 41% and 16.6%, respectively, at a dose of 2×1014cm-2. At this same dose condition, increases of 37% in drain breakdown voltage (VBR) and of 45% in critical voltage (Vcri) were observed. The improvements of drain breakdown voltage and critical voltage were attributed to the modification of the depletion region due to the introduction of a higher density of defects after irradiation at a higher dose.

Original languageEnglish
Article number042202
JournalJournal of Vacuum Science and Technology B: Microelectronics and Nanometer Structures
Volume31
Issue number4
DOIs
StatePublished - Jul 2013

Funding

The work performed at UF was supported by an U.S. DOD HDTRA Grant No. 1-11-1-0020, monitored by James Reed and an AFOSR MURI monitored by James Huang. The devices used in this work were graciously provided by ARFL/RYDD Device Team. The research at Korea University was supported by Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (Grant No. 2012R1A1A2042761). A portion of this research was conducted at the Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences, which is sponsored at Oak Ridge National Laboratory by the Office of Basic Energy Sciences, U.S. Department of Energy.

FundersFunder number
U.S. DoD1-11-1-0020
U.S. Department of Energy
Air Force Office of Scientific Research
Basic Energy Sciences
Oak Ridge National Laboratory
National Research Foundation of Korea
Ministry of Education, Science and Technology2012R1A1A2042761

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