Title |
Radiation Hardness Evaluation of GaN-based Transistors by Particle-beam Irradiation |
Authors |
금동민(Keum, Dongmin) ; 김형탁(Kim, Hyungtak) |
DOI |
https://doi.org/10.5370/KIEE.2017.66.9.1351 |
Keywords |
Gallium nitride(GaN) ; Proton irradiation ; Alpha-particle ; Power semiconductor ; Wide bandgap(WBG) |
Abstract |
In this work, we investigated radiation hardness of GaN-based transistors which are strong candidates for next-generation power electronics. Field effect transistors with three types of gate structures including metal Schottky gate, recessed gate, and p-AlGaN layer gate were fabricated on AlGaN/GaN heterostructure on Si substrate. The devices were irradiated with energetic protons and alpha-particles. The irradiated transistors exhibited the reduction of on-current and the shift of threshold voltage which were attributed to displacement damage by incident energetic particles at high fluence. However, FET operation was still maintained and leakage characteristics were not degraded, suggesting that GaN-based FETs possess high potential for radiation-hardened electronics. |