NER: Silicon Nano Transistors with a QM Tunneling Injection Source

University Of California-Los Angeles, Los Angeles CA

Investigators

Abstract

The objective of this research is to explore silicon nano-transistor with gate-controlled quantum mechanical (band-to-band) tunneling injection source. Such transistor will not suffer the short channel (small size) effects of conventional FETs, and therefore very suitable for nano-dimension applications. The advantage of band-to-band tunneling source is that the off current is not limited by diffusion and therefore the Ion/Ioff is extremely large. It also allows ballistic transport and therefore the on-current is much greater than sub-15nm silicon MOSFET. Simulation shows that such transistor can yield an Ion/Ioff better than 104 times and Ion several times achievable by conventional decameter MOSFETs. This revolutionary device can potentially start a new paradigm for nano-scaled silicon transistors. The success of this research will resolve many of the difficulties identified by the ITRS roadmap, such as voltage scaling, Ioff limitation and Ion degradation, allowing an exciting path for silicon CMOS to extend into sub10-nm regime. The transistor proposed here is a revolutionary approach, yet maintain the basic flavor of decameter MOSFETs. It can therefore be implemented using the well developed CMOS technology. If successful, the impact to semiconductor industry can be extremely significant. It is also an excellent research area for students. Besides investigating the fundamental device physics of these novel transistors, they can gain insights into the operation of deeply scaled MOSFETs, which can be extremely valuable when they eventually work for the industry. To increase their education experience, woman and under-represented minority students will be actively recruited for this research.