Performance analysis of different SRAM cell topologies employing tunnel-FETs

Tunnel-FET is one of the most promising candidates to replace CMOS in low-power (LP) applications [1], featuring a sub-threshold slope (SS) below the 60mV/dec limit of MOSFET. However, the intrinsic asymmetry of TFETs, makes them good transistors only for a current flowing from drain to source and prevents their use as access transistors (AT) in the 6T SRAM cell. In this paper, we use TCAD mixed device-circuit simulations [2] of symmetric 6T SRAM cells, implemented with the n-type SiGe/Si TFET and p-type strained-Si TFET designed in [3] (Fig. 1) for VDD as low as 0.2V. The gate metal work-functions were set to match the off-current for LP applications (10pA/μm). For comparison purposes, both N- and P-MOS were also designed with the same double-gate SOI structure. The ID-VGS curves of the TFETs (Fig.2) show that the sub-60mV/decade region is confined to ultra low voltage regime (below 0.25 V) and that ambipolarity is very limited in these devices. ID(VDS) in Fig.3 show the lower output conductance of the TFETs w.r.t. to MOS.