Papers by Author: Vito Raineri

Abstract: Scanning probe microscopy with conductive tips has been used to image the dielectric properties of ceramics with giant permittivity. In particular, measurements in impedance mode and of local resistivity allowed to image the permittivity map on polycrystalline materials. Such imaging allows to correlate the dielectric properties with the local sample structure and with defects inside the single grains of the polycrystalline ceramics. However, artifacts due to surface imperfections should be distinguished from bulk properties and eliminated.

Abstract: We have designed a set of experiments in which a controlled supersaturation of vacancies can be maintained constant during annealing of a boron implant. In presence of voids, a remarkable reduction of boron diffusivity is observed and, for low fluence B implantation, TED can be totally suppressed. We show that the presence of nanovoids in the B implanted region is not a prerequisite condition for the reduction of B diffusivity. Large voids located at more than 100 nm apart from the B profile still show the same effect. Small voids can also be used to increase the activation of boron. All these results are consistent with the hypothesis that, during annealing, vacancies are injected from the voids region towards the Is rich region in the implanted region where they massively recombine. Finally, we show that BICs cannot be simply dissolved by injecting vacancies into the region where they stand.

Abstract: In this work, the structural and electrical properties of Ti/Al/Ni/Au contacts on n-type Gallium Nitride were studied. An ohmic behaviour was observed after annealing above 700°C. The structural analysis showed the formation of an interfacial TiN layer and different phases in the reacted layer (AlNi, AlAu4, Al2Au) upon annealing. The temperature dependence of the specific contact resistance demonstrated that the current transport occurs through thermoionic field emission in the contacts annealed at 600°C, and field emission after annealing at higher temperatures. By fitting the data with theoretical models, a reduction of the Schottky barrier from 1.21eV after annealing at 600°C to 0.81eV at 800°C was demonstrated, together with a strong increase of the carrier concentration at the interface. The reduction of the contact resistance upon annealing was discussed by correlating the structural and electrical characteristics of the contacts.

Abstract: The fabrication of high sensitive diodes array is very attractive for spectroscopic and astronomical UV imaging applications, particularly when visible light rejection is required. Wide band gap materials are excellent candidates for UV “visible blind” detection. In this paper, we demonstrate an array of Schottky UV-diodes on 4H-SiC with a single pixel area of about 1.44 mm2 and a total area of about 29 mm2. The Schottky photodiodes are based on the pinch-off surface effect, the front electrode being an interdigit Ni2Si contact that allows the direct light exposure of the optically active device area. For the proposed array, the optically active area is about the 48 % of total area. The single pixel dark current was below 0.1 nA up to –50 V and a fabrication yield of about 90 % was observed. The external quantum efficiency of the proposed array exhibits a peak of 45 % at the 289 nm wavelength and a visible rejection ratio > 4 ×103.

Abstract: The surface morphology and the electrical activation of P+ implanted 4H-SiC were investigated with respect to annealing treatments that differ only for the heating rate. P+ implantation was carried out in lightly doped n-type epitaxial layers. The implantation temperature was 300 °C. The computed P profile was 250 nm thick with a concentration of 1×1020 cm-3. Two samples underwent annealing at 1400 °C in argon with different constant ramp up rates equal to 0.05° C/s and 40 °C/s. A third sample underwent an incoherent light Rapid Thermal Annealing (RTA) at 1100 °C in argon before the annealing at 1400 °C with the lower ramp rate. The ramp up of the RTA process is a few hundred degrees per second. Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) micrographs pointed out that the surface roughness of the samples annealed at 1400 °C increases with increasing heating rate and that the critical temperature for surface roughening is above 1100 °C. Independently on the annealing cycle, Scanning Capacitance Microscopy (SCM) measurements showed that the P profiles are uniform over the implantation thickness and have plateau concentration around 9×1018 cm-3 in all the implanted samples. The fraction of P atoms activated as donors is 13% of the total implanted fluence.

Abstract: We present a novel approach based on conductive atomic force microscopy (c-AFM) for nano-scale mapping of the Schottky barrier height (SBH) between a semiconductor and an ultrathin (1-5 nm) metal film. The method was applied to characterize the uniformity of the Au/4H-SiC Schottky contact, which is attractive for applications due to the high reported (∼1.8 eV) SBH value. Since this system is very sensitive to the SiC surface preparation, we investigated the effect on the nano-scale SBH distribution of a ∼2 nm thick not uniform SiO2 layer. The macroscopic I-V characteristics on Au/SiC and Au/not uniform SiO2/SiC diodes showed that the interfacial oxide lowers the average SBH. The c-AFM investigation is carried out collecting arrays of I-V curves for different tip positions on 1μm×1μm area. From these curves, 2D SBH maps are obtained with 10- 20 nm spatial resolution and energy resolution <0.1 eV. The laterally inhomogeneous character of the Au/SiC contact is demonstrated. In fact, a SBH distribution peaked at 1.8 eV and with tails from 1.6 eV to 2.1 eV is obtained. Moreover, in the presence of the not uniform oxide at the interface, the SBH distribution exhibits a 0.3 eV peak lowering and a broadening (tails from 1.1 eV to 2.1 eV).

Abstract: The nano-characterization of thermal oxides grown on 4H-SiC is for the first time presented and analysed to derive its reliability. The dielectric breakdown (BD) kinetics of silicon dioxide (SiO2) thin films thermally grown on 4H-SiC has been determined by comparison between I-V measurements on large-area (up to 1.96×10-5 cm2) metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) structures and conductive atomic force microscopy (C-AFM) with a resolution of a few nanometers. C-AFM clearly images the weak breakdown single spots under constant voltage stresses. The stress time on the single C-AFM tip dot has been varied from 1×10-3 to 1×10-1 s. The density of BD spots, upon increasing the stress time, exhibits an exponential trend. The Weibull slope and the characteristic time of the dielectric BD events were so determined by direct measurements at nanometer scale demonstrating that the percolation model is valid for thin thermal oxide layers on 4H-SiC (5-7nm), but it fails for larger thicknesses (10 nm).

Abstract: The defects formation in ion-irradiated 4H-SiC was investigated and correlated with the electrical properties of Schottky diodes. The diodes were irradiated with 1 MeV Si+-ions, at fluences ranging between 1×109cm-2 and 1.8×1013cm-2. After irradiation, the current-voltage characteristics of the diodes showed an increase of the leakage current with increasing ion fluence. The reverse I-V characteristics of the irradiated diodes monitored as a function of the temperature showed an Arrhenius dependence of the leakage, with an activation energy of 0.64 eV. Deep level transient spectroscopy (DLTS) allowed to demonstrate that the Z1/Z2 center of 4H-SiC is the dominant defect in the increase of the leakage current in the irradiated material.

Abstract: Praseodymium based dielectric thin films have been deposited by Metal-Organic Chemical Vapour Deposition (MOCVD). Special emphasis has been placed upon deposition parameters crucial to obtain Pr2O3 phase and upon interfacial characterization. In addition, dielectric properties have been correlated to structural and compositional characteristics of praseodymium containing films. The breakdown (BD) characteristics of Pr2O3 films have been investigated by an innovative and handling approach based on C-AFM. Moreover, the BD kinetics have been elucidated considering the role of defects in the conduction mechanisms.