European Researchers Drive Semiconductor Technology

摘要

Europeans continue to rise to the challenge of advancing communication, imaging and radar integrated circuits to work at high frequencies. A team at In-teruniversitair Micro-Electronica Centrum Vzw (imec) in Belgium has developed the fT/fMAX 245/450 GHz SiGe:C heterojunction bipolar transistor - a sophisticated device that will help facilitate future high volume millimetre-wave low power circuits to be used in automotive radar applications. The study was funded in part by the Towards 0.5 terahertz silicon/germanium heterojunction bipolar technology (DOTFIVE) project, which received €9.7 M under the Information and Communication Technologies theme of the EU's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7). In order to secure the ultra-high speed requirements, sophisticated SiGe:C HBTs require additional upscaling of the device performance. For the most part, thin sub-collector doping profiles are considered a must for this upscaling. The collector dopants are typically introduced at the start of the process and are, therefore, exposed to the complete thermal budget of the process flow. Because of this, the accurate positioning of the buried collector is harder to obtain.