Fabrication of 4H-SiC Planar MESFETs on High-Purity Semi-Insulating Substrates

4H-SiC planar MESFETs were fabricated using ion-implantation on high-purity semi-insulating substrate, and their DC and RF performances were characterized. A modified RCA method was used to clean the substrate before each procedure. Sacrificial oxide was grown after channel layer etching to eliminate plasma damage to the gate region. A thin, thermal oxide layer was grown to passivate the surface and then a thick field oxide was deposited by CVD. The maximum oscillation frequency of 26.4 GHz and the cut-off frequency of 7.2 GHz were obtained. The power gain was 8.4 dB and the output power was 2.8 W/mm at 2 GHz.