Experimental optimization of post metal annealing on fully depleted-silicon on insulator tunneling field effect transistor

Many attempts have been made to improve the performance of tunneling field-effect transistors (TFETs). Among these, post metal annealing (PMA) can induce enhanced device performance, but its application to TFETs has not been sufficiently explored. In this study, the temperature, time, atmosphere, and pressure conditions for the PMA of a TFET device are optimized. To evaluate if any loss in performance occurred after PMA, we tested the transistors' electrical parameters, specifically their subthreshold slopes and low-frequency noises at 10 Hz. Moreover, the interface trap charge density of the TFETs is extracted as a measure to evaluate their performance. As a result, lower temperatures and shorter PMA times are essential compromises, and the performances were improved under H2 and D2-containing atmospheres. Furthermore, the benefit of having high gas pressures during PMA is noted, because as the number of hydrogen/deuterium atoms increases, more traps-removing surface-gas interactions can occur.