Articolo in rivista, 2020, ENG, 10.1016/j.apsusc.2020.146656

On the origin of the premature breakdown of thermal oxide on 3C-SiC probed by electrical scanning probe microscopy

Fiorenza P.; Schiliro E.; Giannazzo F.; Bongiorno C.; Zielinski M.; La Via F.; Roccaforte F.

Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche - Istituto per la Microelettronica e Microsistemi (CNR-IMM), Strada VIII, n.5 Zona Industriale, Catania, 95121, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche - Istituto per la Microelettronica e Microsistemi (CNR-IMM), Strada VIII, n.5 Zona Industriale, 95121 Catania, Italy, , , Italy; Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche - Istituto per la Microelettronica e Microsistemi (CNR-IMM), Strada VIII, n.5 Zona Industriale, Catania, 95121, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche - Istituto per la Microelettronica e Microsistemi (CNR-IMM), Strada VIII, n.5 Zona Industriale, 95121 Catania, Italy, , , Italy; NOVASiC, Savoie Technolac, BP267, Le Bourget-du-Lac Cedex, F-73375, NOVASiC, Savoie Technolac, BP267, F-73375 Le Bourget-du-Lac Cedex, France, , France

The dielectric breakdown (BD) of thermal oxide (SiO) grown on cubic silicon carbide (3C-SiC) was investigated comparing the electrical behavior of macroscopic metal-oxidesemiconductor (MOS) capacitors with nanoscale current and capacitance mapping using conductive atomic force (C-AFM) and scanning capacitance microscopy (SCM). Spatially resolved statistics of the oxide BD events by C-AFM revealed that the extrinsic premature BD is correlated to the presence of peculiar extended defects, the anti-phase boundaries (APBs), in the 3C-SiC layer. SCM analyses showed a larger carrier density at the stacking faults (SFs) the 3C-SiC, that can be explained by a locally enhanced density of states in the conduction band. On the other hand, a local increase of minority carriers concentration was deduced for APBs, indicating that they behave as conducting defects having also the possibility to trap positive charges. The results were explained with the local electric field enhancement in correspondence of positively charged defects.

Applied surface science 526 , pp. 146656-1–146656-8

Keywords

3C-SiC, oxide breakdown, scanning probe microscopy, power devices, MOS

CNR authors

Schiliro Emanuela, Roccaforte Fabrizio, Giannazzo Filippo, Fiorenza Patrick

CNR institutes

IMM – Istituto per la microelettronica e microsistemi

ID: 424191

Year: 2020

Type: Articolo in rivista

Creation: 2020-06-20 15:36:28.000

Last update: 2020-10-27 10:53:50.000

External IDs

CNR OAI-PMH: oai:it.cnr:prodotti:424191

DOI: 10.1016/j.apsusc.2020.146656

Scopus: 2-s2.0-85085202239