An adapted method for analyzing 4H silicon carbide metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors

摘要

Silicon carbide (SiC) metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors (MOSFETs) are key devices for next-generation power electronics. However, accurate determination of device parameters from 3-terminal characteristics is hampered by the presence of interface traps. Here we present a method that, in contrast to previous evaluation schemes, explicitly considers those defects. A well-tractable parametrization of the SiC/SiO2-specific interface trap spectrum is introduced that reflects the body of known data. With this ingredient, we develop an analysis that targets for an accurate determination of device parameters from simple 3-terminal characteristics. For its validation, we investigate MOSFETs with significantly different defect densities. The resulting parameters – charge carrier density, mobility and threshold voltage – are in excellent agreement with Hall effect investigations on the very same devices, avoiding systematic errors inherent to conventional evaluation techniques. With this adapted scheme, 4H-SiC power MOSFETs, even packaged, can be meaningfully characterized, speeding up innovation cycles in energy-saving power electronics. Silicon carbide is a wide-bandgap semiconductor with outstanding properties for efficient high-power electronic devices whose ultimate potential could not yet be exploited due to the presence of interface traps. The authors develop an experimentally less demanding analysis method that takes such defects into account when determining device parameters.