Trade-Offs Between RF Performance and Total-Dose Tolerance in 45-nm RF-CMOS

The hot carrier and ionizing radiation responses of 45-nm SOI RF nMOSFETs are investigated. Devices with “tight” source/drain (S/D) contact spacing have improved RF performance but degraded hot carrier reliability and radiation tolerance. Devices with “loose” gate finger-to-gate finger spacing have improved RF performance and also improved hot carrier and radiation tolerance. The effects of finger width on the hot carrier stress and ionizing radiation degradation of strained silicon-on-insulator RF MOSFETs are also investigated. Enhanced degradation is observed for devices with wide finger widths and is attributed to the greater channel-region mechanical stress induced impact ionization. This result is contrary to the previous studies which showed that narrow channel width devices should exhibit greater damage. Taken together, these results have serious consequences for RF circuits that require large widths for sufficient RF gain. Finally, devices with symmetric halo doping are observed to exhibit greater total-dose degradation than devices with asymmetric halo doping.

[1]  S. Cristoloveanu,et al.  Silicon-on-nothing MOSFETs: performance, short-channel effects, and backgate coupling , 2004, IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices.

[2]  E. R. Hsieh,et al.  The understanding of strain-induced device degradation in advanced MOSFETs with process-induced strain technology of 65nm node and beyond , 2010, 2010 IEEE International Reliability Physics Symposium.

[3]  A.A. Abidi,et al.  RF CMOS comes of age , 2004, 2003 Symposium on VLSI Circuits. Digest of Technical Papers (IEEE Cat. No.03CH37408).

[4]  S. Narasimha,et al.  Impact of Lateral Asymmetric Channel Doping on 45-nm-Technology N-Type SOI MOSFETs , 2009, IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices.

[5]  K. Ishimaru,et al.  Channel Width Dependence of Hot-Carrier Induced Degradation in Shallow Trench Isolated pMOSFETs , 1998, 28th European Solid-State Device Research Conference.

[6]  Qingqing Liang,et al.  The Enhanced Role of Shallow-Trench Isolation in Ionizing Radiation Damage of 65 nm RF-CMOS on SOI , 2009, IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science.

[7]  Karl Hess,et al.  MOSFET degradation kinetics and its simulation , 2003 .

[8]  M. Turowski,et al.  Temperature-Dependence of Off-State Drain Leakage in X-Ray Irradiated 130 nm CMOS Devices , 2006, IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science.

[9]  J. C. Hsieh,et al.  Impact of the strained SiGe source/drain on hot carrier reliability for 45 nm p-type metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors , 2008 .

[10]  En Xia Zhang,et al.  Layout-Related Stress Effects on Radiation-Induced Leakage Current , 2010, IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science.

[11]  D. Fullagar,et al.  CMOS comes of age , 1980, IEEE Spectrum.

[12]  Daniel M. Fleetwood,et al.  Radiation‐induced charge neutralization and interface‐trap buildup in metal‐oxide‐semiconductor devices , 1990 .

[13]  Chenming Hu,et al.  Enhanced hot-carrier induced degradation in shallow trench isolated narrow channel PMOSFET's , 1998, IEEE Electron Device Letters.

[14]  John D. Cressler,et al.  Impact of Source/Drain contact and gate finger spacing on the RF reliability of 45-nm RF nMOSFETs , 2011, 2011 International Reliability Physics Symposium.

[15]  T. Isaacs-Smith,et al.  The Effects of Proton Irradiation on 90 nm Strained Si CMOS on SOI Devices , 2006, 2006 IEEE Radiation Effects Data Workshop.

[16]  P. Dodd,et al.  Radiation effects in SOI technologies , 2003 .

[17]  S P Buchner,et al.  Evaluating the Influence of Various Body-Contacting Schemes on Single Event Transients in 45-nm SOI CMOS , 2010, IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science.

[18]  Xin Wang,et al.  Stress engineering for 32nm CMOS technology node , 2008, 2008 9th International Conference on Solid-State and Integrated-Circuit Technology.

[19]  John D. Cressler,et al.  Impact of body tie and Source/Drain contact spacing on the hot carrier reliability of 45-nm RF-CMOS , 2010, 2010 IEEE International Integrated Reliability Workshop Final Report.

[20]  C. Capasso,et al.  Total dose radiation response of a 45nm SOI Technology , 2010, 2010 IEEE International SOI Conference (SOI).