Influences of annealing on structural and compositional properties of Al_2O_3 thin films grown on 4H–SiC by atomic layer deposition

Annealing effects on structural and compositional performances of Al_2O_3 thin films on 4H–Si C substrates are studied comprehensively. The Al_2O_3 films are grown by atomic layer deposition through using trimethylaluminum and H_2 O as precursors at 300?C, and annealed at various temperatures in ambient N_2 for 1 min. The Al_2O_3 film transits from amorphous phase to crystalline phase as annealing temperature increases from 750?C to 768?C. The refractive index increases with annealing temperature rising, which indicates that densification occurs during annealing. The densification and grain formation of the film upon annealing are due to crystallization which is relative with second-nearest-neighbor coordination variation according to the x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy(XPS). Although the binding energies of Al 2p and O 1s increase together during crystallization, separations between Al 2p and O 1s are identical between as-deposited and annealed sample, which suggests that the nearest-neighbour coordination is similar.     

Comparative study of electrical characteristics for n-type 4H–SiC planar and trench MOS capacitors annealed in ambient NO

The interface properties and electrical characteristics of the n-type 4H-SiC planar and trench metal–oxide–semiconductor(MOS) capacitors are investigated by measuring the capacitance voltage and current voltage. The flat-band voltage and interface state density are evaluated by the quasi-static method. It is not effective on further improving the interface properties annealing at 1250℃ in NO ambient for above 1 h due to the increasing interface shallow and fast states.These shallow states reduce the effective positive fixed charge density in the oxide. For the vertical MOS capacitors on the(1120) and(1100) faces, the interface state density can be reduced by approximately one order of magnitude, in comparison to the result of the planar MOS capacitors on the(0001) face under the same NO annealing condition. In addition, it is found that Fowler–Nordheim tunneling current occurs at an oxide electric field of 7 MV/cm for the planar MOS device.However, Poole–Frenkel conduction current occurs at a lower electric field of 4 MV/cm for the trench MOS capacitor. This is due to the local field crowded at the trench corner severely causing the electrons to be early captured at or emitted from the SiO_2/Si C interface. These results provide a reference for an in-depth understanding of the mobility-limiting factors and long term reliability of the trench and planar SiO_2/Si C interfaces.