High Current and Rectification in Wafer-Level Planar Nanoscale Air Channel Diodes With Heterogeneous Electrodes

In this study, we address the design and fabrication challenges typically encountered with planar nanoscale air channel diodes (NACDs) by introducing oblique deposition techniques, achieving the first-reported wafer-level planar NACDs with heterogeneous electrodes. By leveraging the work function difference from the heterogeneous electrodes and controlling the cathode-anode height difference as well as tilt angles, we provide a fresh perspective on device design. This approach results in a record output current of 2 mA at 5V for planar NACDs, an ultra-low turn-on voltage of 0.56 V as well as a high rectification ratio exceeding <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$10^{{4}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>. This research offers a novel approach for realizing planar NACDs and paves the way for their integration into low-power, high-speed, high-frequency electronic applications.