Review-Extremely Thin Amorphous Indium Oxide Transistors.

Amorphous oxide semiconductor transistors have been a mature technology in display panels for upward of a decade, and have recently been considered as promising back-end-of-line compatible channel materials for monolithic 3D applications. However, achieving high-mobility amorphous semiconductor materials with comparable performance to traditional crystalline semiconductors has been a long-standing problem. Recently it has been found that greatly reducing the thickness of indium oxide, enabled by an atomic layer deposition (ALD) process, can tune its material properties to achieve high mobility, high drive current, high on/off ratio, and enhancement-mode operation at the same time, beyond the capabilities of conventional oxide semiconductor materials. In this work, the history leading to the re-emergence of indium oxide, its fundamental material properties, growth techniques with a focus on ALD, state-of-the-art indium oxide device research, and the bias stability of the devices are reviewed.

Nanometer-Thick Oxide Semiconductor Transistor with Ultra-High Drain Current.

High drive current is a critical performance parameter in semiconductor devices for high-speed, low-power logic applications or high-efficiency, high-power, high-speed radio frequency (RF) analogue applications. In this work, we demonstrate an In2O3 transistor grown by atomic layer deposition (ALD) at back-end-of-line (BEOL) compatible temperatures with a record high drain current in planar FET, exceeding 10 A/mm, the performance of which is 2-3 times better than all known transistors with semiconductor channels. A high transconductance reaches 4 S/mm, recorded among all transistors with a planar structure. Planar FETs working ballistically or quasi-ballistically are exploited as one of the simplest platforms to investigate the intrinsic transport properties. It is found experimentally and theoretically that a high carrier density and high electron velocity both contribute to this high on-state performance in ALD In2O3 transistors, which is made possible by the high-quality oxide/oxide interface, the metal-like charge-neutrality-level (CNL) alignment, and the high band velocities induced by the low density-of-state (DOS). Experimental Hall, I-V, and split C-V measurements at room temperature confirm a high carrier density of up to 6-7 × 1013 /cm2 and a high velocity of about 107 cm/s, well-supported by density functional theory (DFT) calculations. The simultaneous demonstration of such high carrier concentration and average band velocity is enabled by the exploitation of the ultrafast pulse scheme and heat dissipation engineering.

Ultra-wide bandgap semiconductor Ga2O3 power diodes.

Ultra-wide bandgap semiconductor Ga2O3 based electronic devices are expected to perform beyond wide bandgap counterparts GaN and SiC. However, the reported power figure-of-merit hardly can exceed, which is far below the projected Ga2O3 material limit. Major obstacles are high breakdown voltage requires low doping material and PN junction termination, contradicting with low specific on-resistance and simultaneous achieving of n- and p-type doping, respectively. In this work, we demonstrate that Ga2O3 heterojunction PN diodes can overcome above challenges. By implementing the holes injection in the Ga2O3, bipolar transport can induce conductivity modulation and low resistance in a low doping Ga2O3 material. Therefore, breakdown voltage of 8.32 kV, specific on-resistance of 5.24 mΩ⋅cm2, power figure-of-merit of 13.2 GW/cm2, and turn-on voltage of 1.8 V are achieved. The power figure-of-merit value surpasses the 1-D unipolar limit of GaN and SiC. Those Ga2O3 power diodes demonstrate their great potential for next-generation power electronics applications.

Ionic Control over Ferroelectricity in 2D Layered van der Waals Capacitors.

The van der Waals layered material CuInP2S6 features interesting functional behavior, including the existence of four uniaxial polarization states, polarization reversal against the electric field through Cu ion migration, a negative-capacitance regime, and reversible extraction of Cu ions. At the heart of these characteristics lies the high mobility of Cu ions, which also determines the spontaneous polarization. Therefore, Cu migration across the lattice results in unusual ferroelectric behavior. Here, we demonstrate how the interplay of polar and ionic properties provides a path to ionically controlled ferroelectric behavior, achieved by applying selected DC voltage pulses and subsequently probing ferroelectric switching during fast triangular voltage sweeps. Using current measurements and theoretical calculations, we observe that increasing DC pulse duration results in higher ionic currents, the buildup of an internal electric field that shifts polarization loops, and an increase in total switchable polarization by ∼50% due to the existence of a high polarization phase which is stabilized by the internal electric field. Apart from tuning ferroelectric behavior by selected square pulses, hysteretic polarization switching can even be entirely deactivated and reactivated, resulting in three-state systems where polarization switching is either inhibited or can be performed in two different directions.

ZnO-ferromagnetic metal vertically aligned nanocomposite thin films for magnetic, optical and acoustic metamaterials.

Magnetoacoustic waves generated in piezoelectric and ferromagnetic coupled nanocomposite films through magnetically driven surface acoustic waves present great promise of loss-less data transmission. In this work, ferromagnetic metals of Ni, Co and Co x Ni1-x are coupled with a piezoelectric ZnO matrix in a vertically-aligned nanocomposite (VAN) thin film platform. Oxidation was found to occur in the cases of ZnO-Co, forming a ZnO-CoO VAN, while only very minor oxidation was found in the case of ZnO-Ni VAN. An alloy approach of Co x Ni1-x has been explored to overcome the oxidation during growth. Detailed microstructural analysis reveals limited oxidation of both metals and distinct phase separation between the ZnO and the metallic phases. Highly anisotropic properties including anisotropic ferromagnetic properties and hyperbolic dielectric functions are found in the ZnO-Ni and ZnO-Co x Ni1-x systems. The magnetic metal-ZnO-based hybrid metamaterials in this report present great potential in coupling of optical, magnetic, and piezoelectric properties towards future magnetoacoustic wave devices.

First demonstration of robust tri-gateß-Ga2O3nano-membrane field-effect transistors.

Nano-membrane tri-gateß-gallium oxide (ß-Ga2O3) field-effect transistors (FETs) on SiO2/Si substrate fabricated via exfoliation have been demonstrated for the first time. By employing electron beam lithography, the minimum-sized features can be defined with the footprint channel width of 50 nm. For high-quality interface betweenß-Ga2O3and gate dielectric, atomic layer-deposited 15 nm thick aluminum oxide (Al2O3) was utilized with tri-methyl-aluminum (TMA) self-cleaning surface treatment. The fabricated devices demonstrate extremely low subthreshold slope (SS) of 61 mV dec-1, high drain current (IDS) ON/OFF ratio of 1.5 × 109, and negligible transfer characteristic hysteresis. We also experimentally demonstrated robustness of these devices with current-voltage (I-V) characteristics measured at temperatures up to 400 °C.

Bilayer Quantum Hall States in an n-Type Wide Tellurium Quantum Well.

Tellurium (Te) is a narrow bandgap semiconductor with a unique chiral crystal structure. The topological nature of electrons in the Te conduction band can be studied by realizing n-type doping using atomic layer deposition (ALD) technique on two-dimensional (2D) Te film. In this work, we fabricated and measured the double-gated n-type Te Hall-bar devices, which can operate as two separate or coupled electron layers controlled by the top gate and back gate. Profound Shubnikov-de Haas (SdH) oscillations are observed in both top and bottom electron layers. Landau level hybridization between two layers, compound and charge-transferable bilayer quantum Hall states at filling factor ν = 4, 6, and 8, are analyzed. Our work opens the door for the study of Weyl physics in coupled bilayer systems of 2D materials.

Asymmetric Metal/α-In2Se3/Si Crossbar Ferroelectric Semiconductor Junction.

A ferroelectric semiconductor junction is a promising two-terminal ferroelectric device for nonvolatile memory and neuromorphic computing applications. In this work, we propose and report the experimental demonstration of asymmetric metal/α-In2Se3/Si crossbar ferroelectric semiconductor junctions (c-FSJs). The depletion in doped Si is used to enhance the modulation of the effective Schottky barrier height through the ferroelectric polarization. A high-performance α-In2Se3 c-FSJ is achieved with a high on/off ratio > 104 at room temperature, on/off ratio > 103 at an elevated temperature of 140 °C, retention > 104 s, and endurance > 106 cycles. The on/off ratio of the α-In2Se3 asymmetric FSJs can be further enhanced to >108 by introducing a metal/α-In2Se3/insulator/metal structure.

Why In2O3 Can Make 0.7 nm Atomic Layer Thin Transistors.

In this work, we demonstrate enhancement-mode field-effect transistors by an atomic-layer-deposited (ALD) amorphous In2O3 channel with thickness down to 0.7 nm. Thickness is found to be critical on the materials and electron transport of In2O3. Controllable thickness of In2O3 at atomic scale enables the design of sufficient 2D carrier density in the In2O3 channel integrated with the conventional dielectric. The threshold voltage and channel carrier density are found to be considerably tuned by channel thickness. Such a phenomenon is understood by the trap neutral level (TNL) model, where the Fermi-level tends to align deeply inside the conduction band of In2O3 and can be modulated to the bandgap in atomic layer thin In2O3 due to the quantum confinement effect, which is confirmed by density function theory (DFT) calculation. The demonstration of enhancement-mode amorphous In2O3 transistors suggests In2O3 is a competitive channel material for back-end-of-line (BEOL) compatible transistors and monolithic 3D integration applications.

Indium-Tin-Oxide Transistors with One Nanometer Thick Channel and Ferroelectric Gating.

In this work, we demonstrate high-performance indium-tin-oxide (ITO) transistors with a channel thickness down to 1 nm and ferroelectric Hf0.5Zr0.5O2 as gate dielectric. An on-current of 0.243 A/mm is achieved on submicron gate-length ITO transistors with a channel thickness of 1 nm, while it increases to as high as 1.06 A/mm when the channel thickness increases to 2 nm. A raised source/drain structure with a thickness of 10 nm is employed, contributing to a low contact resistance of 0.15 Ω·mm and a low contact resistivity of 1.1 × 10-7 Ω·cm2. The ITO transistor with a recessed channel and ferroelectric gating demonstrates several advantages over 2D semiconductor transistors and other thin-film transistors, including large-area wafer-size nanometer thin-film formation, low contact resistance and contact resistivity, an atomic thin channel being immune to short channel effects, large gate modulation of high carrier density by ferroelectric gating, high-quality gate dielectric and passivation formation, and a large bandgap for the low-power back-end-of-line complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor application.

Quantum Hall effect of Weyl fermions in n-type semiconducting tellurene.

Dirac and Weyl nodal materials can host low-energy relativistic quasiparticles. Under strong magnetic fields, the topological properties of Dirac/Weyl materials can directly be observed through quantum Hall states. However, most Dirac/Weyl nodes generically exist in semimetals without exploitable band gaps due to their accidental band-crossing origin. Here, we report the first experimental observation of Weyl fermions in a semiconductor. Tellurene, the two-dimensional form of tellurium, possesses a chiral crystal structure which induces unconventional Weyl nodes with a hedgehog-like radial spin texture near the conduction band edge. We synthesize high-quality n-type tellurene by a hydrothermal method with subsequent dielectric doping and detect a topologically non-trivial π Berry phase in quantum Hall sequences. Our work expands the spectrum of Weyl matter into semiconductors and offers a new platform to design novel quantum devices by marrying the advantages of topological materials to versatile semiconductors.

A tunable ferroelectric based unreleased RF resonator.

This paper introduces the first tunable ferroelectric capacitor (FeCAP)-based unreleased RF MEMS resonator, integrated seamlessly in Texas Instruments' 130 nm Ferroelectric RAM (FeRAM) technology. The designs presented here are monolithically integrated in solid-state CMOS technology, with no post-processing or release step typical of other MEMS devices. An array of FeCAPs in this complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) technology's back-end-of-line (BEOL) process were used to define the acoustic resonance cavity as well as the electromechanical transducers. To achieve high quality factor (Q) of the resonator, acoustic waveguiding for vertical confinement within the CMOS stack is studied and optimized. Additional design considerations are discussed to obtain lateral confinement and suppression of spurious modes. An FeCAP resonator is demonstrated with fundamental resonance at 703 MHz and Q of 1012. This gives a frequency-quality factor product f ⋅ Q = 7.11 × 1 0 11 which is 1.6× higher than the most state-of-the-art Pb(Zr,Ti)O3 (PZT) resonators. Due to the ferroelectric characteristics of the FeCAPs, transduction of the resonator can be switched on and off by adjusting the electric polarization. In this case, the resonance can be turned off completely at ±0.3 V corresponding to the coercive voltage of the constituent FeCAP transducers. These novel switchable resonators may have promising applications in on-chip timing, ad-hoc radio front ends, and chip-scale sensors.

Solar-Blind UV Photodetector Based on Atomic Layer-Deposited Cu2O and Nanomembrane ß-Ga2O3 pn Oxide Heterojunction.

Herein, we present a solar-blind ultraviolet photodetector realized using atomic layer-deposited p-type cuprous oxide (Cu2O) underneath a mechanically exfoliated n-type ß-gallium oxide (ß-Ga2O3) nanomembrane. The atomic layer deposition process of the Cu2O film applies bis(N,N'-di-secbutylacetamidinato)dicopper(I) [Cu(5Bu-Me-amd)]2 as a novel Cu precursor and water vapor as an oxidant. The exfoliated ß-Ga2O3 nanomembrane was transferred to the top of the Cu2O layer surface to realize a unique oxide pn heterojunction, which is not easy to realize by conventional oxide epitaxy techniques. The current-voltage (I-V) characteristics of the fabricated pn heterojunction diode show the typical rectifying behavior. The fabricated Cu2O/ß-Ga2O3 photodetector achieves sensitive detection of current at the picoampere scale in the reverse mode. This work provides a new approach to integrate all oxide heterojunctions using membrane transfer and bonding techniques, which goes beyond the limitation of conventional heteroepitaxy.

Room-Temperature Electrocaloric Effect in Layered Ferroelectric CuInP2S6 for Solid-State Refrigeration.

A material with reversible temperature change capability under an external electric field, known as the electrocaloric effect (ECE), has long been considered as a promising solid-state cooling solution. However, electrocaloric (EC) performance of EC materials generally is not sufficiently high for real cooling applications. As a result, exploring EC materials with high performance is of great interest and importance. Here, we report on the ECE of ferroelectric materials with van der Waals layered structure (CuInP2S6 or CIPS in this work in particular). Over 60% polarization charge change is observed within a temperature change of only 10 K at Curie temperature. Large adiabatic temperature change (|ΔT|) of 3.3 K and isothermal entropy change (|ΔS|) of 5.8 J kg-1 K-1 at |ΔE| = 142.0 kV cm-1 and at 315 K (above and near room temperature) are achieved, with a large EC strength (|ΔT|/|ΔE|) of 29.5 mK cm kV-1. The ECE of CIPS is also investigated theoretically by numerical simulation, and a further EC performance projection is provided.

Ultrafast measurements of polarization switching dynamics on ferroelectric and anti-ferroelectric hafnium zirconium oxide.

The ultrafast measurements of polarization switching dynamics on ferroelectric (FE) and antiferroelectric (AFE) hafnium zirconium oxide (HZO) are studied. The transient current during the polarization switching process is probed directly on the nanosecond scale. The switching time is determined to be as fast as 10 ns to reach fully switched polarization with characteristic switching times of 5.4 ns for FE HZO and 4.5 ns for AFE HZO by the nucleation limited switching model. The limitation by the parasitic effect on capacitor charging is found to be critical in the correct and accurate measurements of intrinsic polarization switching speed of HZO.

Ferroelectric Field-Effect Transistors Based on MoS2 and CuInP2S6 Two-Dimensional van der Waals Heterostructure.

We demonstrate room-temperature ferroelectric field-effect transistors (Fe-FETs) with MoS2 and CuInP2S6 two-dimensional (2D) van der Waals heterostructure. The ferroelectric CuInP2S6 is a 2D ferroelectric insulator, integrated on top of MoS2 channel providing a 2D/2D semiconductor/insulator interface without dangling bonds. The MoS2- and CuInP2S6-based 2D van der Waals heterostructure Fe-FETs exhibit a clear counterclockwise hysteresis loop in transfer characteristics, demonstrating their ferroelectric properties. This stable nonvolatile memory property can also be modulated by the back-gate bias of the MoS2 transistors because of the tuning of capacitance matching between the MoS2 channel and the ferroelectric CuInP2S6, leading to the enhancement of the on/off current ratio. Meanwhile, the CuInP2S6 thin film also shows resistive switching characteristics with more than four orders of on/off ratio between low- and high-resistance states, which is also promising for resistive random-access memory applications.

Steep-Slope WSe2 Negative Capacitance Field-Effect Transistor.

P-type two-dimensional steep-slope negative capacitance field-effect transistors are demonstrated for the first time with WSe2 as channel material and ferroelectric hafnium zirconium oxide in gate dielectric stack. F4-TCNQ is used as p-type dopant to suppress electron leakage current and to reduce Schottky barrier width for holes. WSe2 negative capacitance field-effect transistors with and without internal metal gate structures and the internal field-effect transistors are compared and studied. Significant SS reduction is observed in WSe2 negative capacitance field-effect transistors by inserting the ferroelectric hafnium zirconium oxide layer, suggesting the existence of internal amplification (∼10) due to the negative capacitance effect. Subthreshold slope less than 60 mV/dec (as low as 14.4 mV/dec) at room temperature is obtained for both forward and reverse gate voltage sweeps. Negative differential resistance is observed at room temperature on WSe2 negative capacitance field-effect-transistors as the result of negative capacitance induced negative drain-induced-barrier-lowering effect.

Steep-slope hysteresis-free negative capacitance MoS2 transistors.

The so-called Boltzmann tyranny defines the fundamental thermionic limit of the subthreshold slope of a metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET) at 60 mV dec-1 at room temperature and therefore precludes lowering of the supply voltage and overall power consumption 1,2 . Adding a ferroelectric negative capacitor to the gate stack of a MOSFET may offer a promising solution to bypassing this fundamental barrier 3 . Meanwhile, two-dimensional semiconductors such as atomically thin transition-metal dichalcogenides, due to their low dielectric constant and ease of integration into a junctionless transistor topology, offer enhanced electrostatic control of the channel 4-12 . Here, we combine these two advantages and demonstrate a molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) two-dimensional steep-slope transistor with a ferroelectric hafnium zirconium oxide layer in the gate dielectric stack. This device exhibits excellent performance in both on and off states, with a maximum drain current of 510 µA µm-1 and a sub-thermionic subthreshold slope, and is essentially hysteresis-free. Negative differential resistance was observed at room temperature in the MoS2 negative-capacitance FETs as the result of negative capacitance due to the negative drain-induced barrier lowering. A high on-current-induced self-heating effect was also observed and studied.

One-Dimensional van der Waals Material Tellurium: Raman Spectroscopy under Strain and Magneto-Transport.

Experimental demonstrations of one-dimensional (1D) van der Waals material tellurium (Te) have been presented by Raman spectroscopy under strain and magneto-transport. Raman spectroscopy measurements have been performed under strains along different principle axes. Pronounced strain response along the c-axis is observed due to the strong intrachain covalent bonds, while no strain response is obtained along the a-axis due to the weak interchain van der Waals interaction. Magneto-transport results further verify its anisotropic property, which results in dramatically distinct magneto-resistance behaviors in terms of three different magnetic field directions. Specifically, phase coherence length extracted from weak antilocalization effect, Lϕ ≈ T-0.5, claims its two-dimensional (2D) transport characteristics when an applied magnetic field is perpendicular to the thin film. In contrast, Lϕ ≈ T-0.33 is obtained from universal conductance fluctuations once the magnetic field is along the c-axis of Te, which indicates its nature of 1D transport along the helical atomic chains. Our studies, which are obtained on high quality single crystal Te thin film, appear to serve as strong evidence of its 1D van der Waals structure from experimental perspectives. It is the aim of this paper to address this special concept that differs from the previous well-studied 1D nanowires or 2D van der Waals materials.

ß-Ga2O3 Nanomembrane Negative Capacitance Field-Effect Transistors with Steep Subthreshold Slope for Wide Band Gap Logic Applications.

Steep-slope ß-Ga2O3 nanomembrane negative capacitance field-effect transistors (NC-FETs) are demonstrated with ferroelectric hafnium zirconium oxide in the gate dielectric stack. Subthreshold slope less than 60 mV/dec at room temperature is obtained for both forward and reverse gate-voltage sweeps with a minimum value of 34.3 mV/dec at the reverse gate-voltage sweep and 53.1 mV/dec at the forward gate-voltage sweep at V DS = 0.5 V. Enhancement-mode operation with a threshold voltage of ∼0.4 V is achieved by tuning the thickness of the ß-Ga2O3 membrane. Low hysteresis of less than 0.1 V is obtained. The steep-slope, low hysteresis, and enhancement-mode ß-Ga2O3 NC-FETs are promising as an nFET candidate for future wide band gap complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor logic applications.