Charge balancing in GaN-based 2-D electron gas devices employing an additional 2-D hole gas and its influence on dynamic behaviour of GaN-based heterostructure field effect transistors

摘要

GaN-based heterostructure FETs (HFETs) featuring a 2-D electron gas (2DEG) can offer very attractive device performance for power-switching applications. This performance can be assessed by evaluation of the dynamic on-resistance R_(on,dyn) vs. the breakdown voltage V_(bd). In literature, it has been shown that with a high V_(bd), R_(on,dyn) is deteriorated. The impairment of R_(on,dyn) is mainly driven by electron injection into surface, barrier, and buffer traps. Electron injection itself depends on the electric field which typically peaks at the gate edge towards the drain. A concept suitable to circumvent this issue is the charge-balancing concept which employs a 2-D hole gas (2DHG) on top of the 2DEG allowing for the electric field peak to be suppressed. Furthermore, the 2DEG concentration in the active channel cannot decrease by a change of the surface potential. Hence, beside an improvement in breakdown voltage, also an improvement in dynamic behaviour can be expected. Whereas the first aspect has already been demonstrated, the second one has not been under investigation so far. Hence, in this report, the effect of charge-balancing is discussed and its impact on the dynamic characteristics of HFETs is evaluated. It will be shown that with appropriate device design, the dynamic behaviour of HFETs can be improved by inserting an additional 2DHG.