Reverse Gate Leakage Induced Buffer Charging and Threshold Voltage Shift of GaN HEMTs

We discuss a physical mechanism in the AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) that partial electrons from reverse gate leakage (<inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${I}_{\text {g,off}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>) inject into the HEMT buffer and thereby shift the HEMT threshold voltage (<inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\Delta {V}_{\text {th}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>). We analyze the <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\Delta {V}_{\text {th}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> dependences on parameters including gate lengths, front barrier (FB) thickness, gate bias voltage, drain bias voltage, and the distance between the gate and the buffer. We specifically investigate the off-state stress with nonzero and zero <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${V}_{\text {ds}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>. The experiment with zero <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${V}_{\text {ds}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> helps identify the <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${I}_{\text {g,off}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> induced C doped GaN (C-GaN) charging; while the one nonzero <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${V}_{\text {ds}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> indicates a fast increase of C-GaN charging induced <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\Delta {V}_{\text {th}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> with <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${V}_{\mathbf {ds}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>. The <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\Delta {V}_{\text {th}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> issue is significant for downscaled HEMTs with a short gate length and a close distance between the gate and the buffer. The issue is thus critical for downscaled HEMTs in high-speed RF applications. We propose a simple analytical expression for the <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\Delta {V}_{\text {th}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> and demonstrate methods to reduce the <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\Delta {V}_{\text {th}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>.