Book Review: Modern Semiconductor Fabrication Technology

limitations and perspectives, and which has been significantly up-dated in general. The first five chapters cover the physics of semiconductor materials, silicon technology, metalsemiconductor contacts, the p n junction (including a brief introduction to the JFET) and currents in p n junctions. This division of the treatment for the p n junction is a pointer to the thorough grounding in fundamentals, a feature which is maintained throughout the book. The consistently high standard is matched by a lucid style, and is supplemented by worked examples. Furthermore, numerous problems are set at the end of each chapter. There is a tendency for an over-academic approach. For example the basic junction diode equation is not formulated until well on in Chapter 5. (Fortuitously there is an identical expression for the metal-semiconductor junction in Chapter 3.) When it does appear, the expression does not show directly the temperature dependence of the I/V relationship. Chapters 6 and 7 cover bipolar transistors, the basic operation being followed by a description of the Early and Kirk effects, the behaviour at low and high emitter bias, high level injection and other phenomena. The book concludes with three chapters on MOS fundamentals and the MOSFET. After a very good introduction on MOS principles, Chapter 9 gives the basic MOSFET theory, whilst Chapter 10 concentrates on channel velocity limitations, small geometries, and scaling. The book has to be criticized on two counts. First the treatment given on modelling is not sufficient for computer simulation: a proper description of the SPICE-type models for the BJT and the MOSFET is lacking. The models shown for the BJT are inadequate, and there is no schematic for a large-signal MOSFET model. Only a cursory mention is made of the modified equations leading to the Schichman-Hodges model (SPICE MOS I). A description of the SPICE models MOS 2 and MOS 3 would have been most valuable. Secondly, numerical values for key parameters of BJT transistors having the geometries given in Table 6.1, and of MOSFET transistors with the structures mentioned in Chapter 10, should have been indicated and discussed. The over-theoretical approach mentioned earlier is probably responsible for this omission. All in all, this is an excellent book, easily among the best on the subject. It deserves a place in industrial and research establishments, and is also highly recommended to undergraduates and M.Sc. postgraduates on courses which delve into silicon device fundamentals. Produced in paperback as well as hardback the book is, thank goodness, within reach of individual purchase. L. J. HERBST, Department ofElectrical. Instrumentation and Control Engineering. Teesside Polytechnic