Improved Ge surface passivation with ultrathin SiO/sub x/ enabling high-mobility surface channel pMOSFETs featuring a HfSiO/WN gate stack

Abstract

To realize high-mobility surface channel pMOSFETs on Ge, a 1.6-nm-thick SiOX passivation layer between the bulk Ge substrate and HfSiO gate dielectric was introduced. This approach provides a simple alternative to epitaxial Si deposition followed by selective oxidation and leads to one of the highest peak hole mobilities reported for unstrained surface channel pMOSFETs on Ge: 332 cm2 • V−1 • s−1 at 0.05 MV/cm—a 2× enhancement over the universal Si/SiO2 mobility. The devices show well-behaved output and transfer characteristics, an equivalent oxide thickness of 1.85 nm and an ION/IOFF ratio of 3 × 103 without detectable fast transient charging. The high hole mobility of these devices is attributed to adequate passivation of the Ge surface.