Metal-related gate sinking due to interfacial oxygen layer in Ir/InAlN high electron mobility transistors

We report on an annealing-induced "gate sinking" effect in a 2-nm-thin In0.17Al0.83N/AlN barrier high electron mobility transistor with Ir gate. Investigations by transmission electron microscopy linked the effect to an oxygen containing interlayer between the gate metal and the InAlN layer and revealed diffusion of oxygen into iridium during annealing. Below 700 degrees C the diffusion is inhomogeneous and seems to occur along grain boundaries, which is consistent with the capacitance-voltage analysis. Annealing at 700 degrees C increased the gate capacitance over a factor 2, shifted the threshold voltage from +0.3 to +1 V and increased the transconductance from 400 to 640 mS/mm. (C) 2010 American Institute of Physics. [doi: 10.1063/1.3458700

Ultrathin InAlN/AlN Barrier HEMT With High Performance in Normally Off Operation

We present GaN-based high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) with a 2-nm-thin InAlN/AlN barrier capped with highly doped n(++) GaN. Selective etching of the cap layer results in a well-controllable ultrathin barrier enhancement-mode device with a threshold voltage of +0.7 V. The n(++) GaN layer provides a 290-Omega/square sheet resistance in the HEMT access region and eliminates current dispersion measured by pulsed IV without requiring additional surface passivation. Devices with a gate length of 0.5-mu m exhibit maximum drain current of 800 mA/mm, maximum transconductance of 400 mS/mm, and current cutoff frequency f(T) of 33.7 GHz. In addition, we demonstrate depletion-mode devices on the same wafer, opening up perspectives for reproducible high-performance InAlN-based digital integrated circuits

Fabrication of Disposable Topographic Silicon Oxide from Sawtoothed Patterns: Control of Arrays of Gold Nanoparticles

Disposable topographic silicon oxide patterns were fabricated from polymeric replicas of sawtoothed glass surfaces, spin-coating of poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) thin films, and thermal annealing at certain temperature and followed by oxygen plasma treatment of the thin PDMS layer. A simple imprinting process was used to fabricate the replicated PDMS and PS patterns from sawtoothed glass surfaces. Next, thin layers of PDMS films having different thicknesses were spin-coated onto the sawtoothed PS surfaces and annealed at 60 degrees C to be drawn the PDMS into the valley of the sawtoothed PS surfaces, followed by oxygen plasma treatment to fabricate topographic silicon oxide patterns. By control of the thickness of PDMS layers, silicon oxide patterns having various line widths were fabricated. The silicon oxide topographic patterns were used to direct the self-assembly of polystyrene-block-poly(2-vinylpyridine) (PS-b-P2VP) block copolymer thin films via solvent annealing process. A highly ordered PS-b-P2VP micellar structure was used to let gold precursor complex with P2VP chains, and followed by oxygen plasma treatment. When the PS-b-P2VP thin films containing gold salts were exposed to oxygen plasma environments, gold salts were reduced to pure gold nanoparticles without changing high degree of lateral order, while polymers were completely degraded. As the width of trough and crest in topographic patterns increases, the number of gold arrays and size of gold nanoparticles are tuned. In the final step, the silicon oxide topographic patterns were selectively removed by wet etching process without changing the arrays of gold nanoparticles.close

NanoPen: dynamic, low-power, and light-actuated patterning of nanoparticles

We introduce NanoPen, a novel technique for low optical power intensity, flexible, real-time reconfigurable, and large-scale light-actuated patterning of single or multiple nanoparticles, such as metallic spherical nanocrystals, and one-dimensional nanostructures, such as carbon nanotubes. NanoPen is capable of dynamically patterning nanoparticles over an area of thousands of square micrometers with light intensities <10 W/cm2 (using a commercial projector) within seconds. Various arbitrary nanoparticle patterns and arrays (including a 10 × 10 array covering a 0.025 mm2 area) are demonstrated using this capability. One application of NanoPen is presented through the creation of surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy hot-spots by patterning gold nanoparticles of 90 nm diameter with enhancement factors exceeding 107 and picomolar concentration sensitivities