Characteristics improvement and carrier transportation of CeO2 gate dielectrics with rapid thermal annealing

Abstract

In this paper, we have investigated the properties and carrier transportation of ultra-thin cerium dioxide films with rapid thermal annealing. Improved characteristics such as low leakage current, high breakdown voltage and large time-dependent-dielectric-breakdown (TDDB) are obtained owing to the more stoichiometric of the CeO2 films after high temperature annealing. Moreover, temperature dependence of gate leakage current under substrate injection is studied, and the carrier conduction mechanisms, including the Frenkel-Poole (F-P) conduction and the Fowler-Nordheim (F-N) tunneling are also proposed, from which we have deduced the energy band diagram of Al/CeO2/n-Si structure for the first time.