B. Grimbert

Punch-through in short-channel AlGaN/GaN HFETs

Short-channel punch-through effects are demonstrated in 0.17 /spl mu/m gate length AlGaN/GaN single heterojunction field-effect transistors. These take the form of a high output conductance and the strong dependence of pinch-off voltage on drain voltage. It is shown by simulation that they can be explained by poor confinement of charge at the AlGaN/GaN interface resulting in current flow within the bulk of the GaN layer. This is caused by there being a concentration of only /spl sim/1.5/spl times/10/sup 16/ cm/sup -3/ deep levels in the insulating GaN buffer layer. It is found that a net acceptor density of around 10/sup 17/ cm/sup -3/ is required to ensure suppression of short-channel effects.

Output power density of 5.1/mm at 18 GHz with an AlGaN/GaN HEMT on Si substrate

Microwave frequency capabilities of AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) on high resistive silicon (111) substrate for power applications are demonstrated in this letter. A maximum dc current density of 1 A/mm and an extrinsic current gain cutoff frequency (F/sub T/) of 50 GHz are achieved for a 0.25 /spl mu/m gate length device. Pulsed and large signal measurements show the good quality of the epilayer and the device processing. The trapping phenomena are minimized and consequently an output power density of 5.1 W/mm is reached at 18 GHz on a 2/spl times/50/spl times/0.25 /spl mu/m/sup 2/ HEMT with a power gain of 9.1dB.

Evidence of traps creation in GaN/AlGaN/GaN HEMTs after a 3000 hour on-state and off-state hot-electron stress

A long-term 3000-hour test under on-state conditions (VDS =25V, 6W/mm constant dissipated power) and off-state conditions (V DS=46V, VGS=-6V) on GaN/AlGaN/GaN HEMTs is presented. Trapping presence and hot-electrons effect are characterized by means of low-frequency techniques (low-frequency noise measurements, transconductance frequency dispersion, gate-lag). The on-state stress shows the most important degradation. Since our measurements point out to the creation of traps in the gate-to-drain surface region during the stress, this degradation is ascribed to the effect of hot-electrons

AlGaN-GaN HEMTs on Si with power density performance of 1.9 W/mm at 10 GHz

AlGaN-GaN high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) on silicon substrate are fabricated. The device with a gate length of 0.3-/spl mu/m and a total gate periphery of 300 /spl mu/m, exhibits a maximum drain current density of 925 mA/mm at V/sub GS/=0 V and V/sub DS/=5 V with an extrinsic transconductance (g/sub m/) of about 250 mS/mm. At 10 GHz, an output power density of 1.9 W/mm associated to a power-added efficiency of 18% and a linear gain of 16 dB are achieved at a drain bias of 30 V. To our knowledge, these power results represent the highest output power density ever reported at this frequency on GaN HEMT grown on silicon substrates.

Design of a X-band GaN oscillator: from the low frequency noise device characterization and large signal modeling to circuit design

Although GaN technologies were initially developed for solid state source amplifiers, it was recently demonstrated that AlGaN/GaN HEMT transistors were also suitable for low noise applications such as LNA (Tartarin et al., 2005). The frequency synthesis is not yet widely explored for these technologies. In this paper the design of a low phase noise X-band oscillator is proposed. The low frequency noise performance and the residual phase noise, as well as dynamic S-parameters were carried out on AlGaN/GaN HEMT grown on SiC. A large-signal modeling technique is also presented. The reduced complexity and the good accuracy of our large signal model permits an efficient circuit design, without intensive knowledge of the technological device parameters. These characterization and modeling tools are used for the design of an 1-stage oscillator working at 10 GHz delivering 20dBm

94-GHz MMIC CPW low-noise amplifier on InP

High performances have been achieved at W-band with a 2- stage, 0.1 micrometers gate-length InGaAs/InAlAs/InP LM-HEMT MMIC low noise amplifier in coplanar technology. To obtain the T- gate profile, we use silicon nitride SixNy technology, which leads to naturally passivated devices. For a drain-to-source current Ids equals 350 mA/mm the devices demonstrate a maximum intrinsic transconductance Gm of 1600 mS/mm and an intrinsic current gain cutoff frequency Fc equals 220 GHz. The extrinsic current gain cut-off frequency Ft is 175 GHz. The LNA shows a minimum noise figure of 3.3 dB with an associated gain of 11.5 dB at 94 GHz.