Correlation of proton irradiation induced threshold voltage shifts to deep level traps in AlGaN/GaN heterostructures
Abstract
The impact of proton irradiation on the threshold voltage (VT) of AlGaN/GaN heterostructures is systematically investigated to enhance the understanding of a primary component of the degradation of irradiated high electron mobility transistors. The value of VT was found to increase monotonically as a function of 1.8 MeV proton fluence in a sub-linear manner reaching 0.63 V at a fluence of 1 × 1014 cm−2. Silvaco Atlas simulations of VT shifts caused by GaN buffer traps using experimentally measured introduction rates, and energy levels closely match the experimental results. Different buffer designs lead to different VT dependences on proton irradiation, confirming that deep, acceptor-like defects in the GaN buffer are primarily responsible for the observed VT shifts. The proton irradiation induced VT shifts are found to depend on the barrier thickness in a linear fashion; thus, scaling the barrier thickness could be an effective way to reduce such degradation.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Pub Defense Publication
- Publication Date
- Apr 28, 2016
- Source ID
- 10.1063/1.4948298
Entities
People
- A. Sasikumar
- Aaron R. Arehart
- D. M. Fleetwood
- D. W. Cardwell
- E. C. H. Kyle
- En Xia Zhang
- James S. Speck
- Jiayu Chen
- Ronald D. Schrimpf
- Steven A. Ringel
- Z. Zhang
Organizations
- Defense Threat Reduction Agency
- Office of Naval Research
- Ohio State University
- University of California
- Vanderbilt University