Variability and Reliability of Single-Walled Carbon Nanotube Field Effect Transistors

Excellent electrical performance and extreme sensitivity to chemical species in semiconducting Single-Walled Carbon NanoTubes (s-SWCNTs) motivated the study of using them to replace silicon as a next generation field effect transistor (FET) for electronic, optoelectronic, and biological applications. In addition, use of SWCNTs in the recently studied flexible electronics appears more promising because of SWCNTs’ inherent flexibility and superior electrical performance over silicon-based materials. All these applications require SWCNT-FETs to have a wafer-scale uniform and reliable performance over time to a level that is at least comparable with the currently used silicon-based nanoscale FETs. Due to similarity in device configuration and its operation, SWCNT-FET inherits most of the variability and reliability concerns of silicon-based FETs, namely the ones originating from line edge roughness, metal work-function variation, oxide defects, etc. Additional challenges arise from the lack of chirality control in as-grown and post-processed SWCNTs and also from the presence of unstable hydroxyl (–OH) groups near the interface of SWCNT and dielectric. In this review article, we discuss these variability and reliability origins in SWCNT-FETs. Proposed solutions for mitigating each of these sources are presented and a future perspective is provided in general, which are required for commercial use of SWCNT-FETs in future nanoelectronic applications.

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