Background
The wide-bandgap semiconductor GaN is considered to be a very important field of next-generation high-efficiency power switch because of its outstanding material properties, such as high breakdown field strength, high electron saturation mobility and the likePromising competitors. In addition, due to the extremely strong spontaneous polarization effect, a concentration as high as 10 naturally exists at the conventional AlGaN/GaN heterojunction interface13cm-2The mobility of the 2DEG can reach 2000cm2The advantage of/V.S is that the GaN power electronic device based on the AlGaN/GaN heterojunction can have faster switching speed, but at the same time, the conventional heterojunction high mobility transistor (HEMT) is a depletion mode device, namely, the device is in a normal open state and the threshold voltage of the device is a negative value under zero gate voltage. In practical applications, however, enhancement mode devices are indispensable for safe operation of power electronic systems in order to ensure that the devices have operating currents only when biased with a positive gate voltage. Therefore, many researchers at home and abroad are working on realizing the high-performance enhanced GaN HEMT.
At present, two ways are mainly used for realizing enhancement operation of a GaN-based device, namely, a low-voltage enhancement type silicon-based MOSFET and a high-voltage depletion type GaN device are integrated and packaged into a system capable of realizing enhancement operation by adopting a cascode structure; and the other is that an enhanced high-voltage GaN power device is directly adopted. The cascode structure has the advantages that the cascode structure is mainly controlled on a silicon-based MOSFET, and the grid of the GaN-based device is not directly controlled, so that the system has no working current when in zero bias, and can be quickly opened by utilizing the normally-open GaN-based device when in forward bias above threshold voltage. After all, the grid control does not directly act on the GaN-based device, the conversion efficiency control of the power switch is not good, and this will greatly affect the safe operation of the system and the ripple noise, so the high-voltage enhanced GaN power device with direct grid control still needs to be necessary.
The enhanced GaN power device is mainly realized by the following two methods: 1. a P-Type GaN layer grows on the surface of an AlGaN/GaN heterojunction, and the thickness and doping of the P-Type GaN layer are reasonably designed to effectively exhaust 2DEG at a heterojunction interface, so that a normally-off GaN power device is realized. 2. The thickness of the AlGaN layer in the gate region is reduced, inherent positive polarization charges under the gate are eliminated, and the 2DEG at the heterojunction interface is exhausted, so that the normally-off GaN power device is realized.
Disclosure of Invention
In order to overcome the defects of the method 2 for realizing the enhanced GaN power device technology, the invention provides a novel epitaxial layer structure by focusing on the design of the AlGaN/GaN heterojunction epitaxial layer structure, and the AlGaN barrier layer is removed by adopting a traditional dry etching process which is simple and easy to realize, so that the enhanced GaN power device with positive threshold voltage can be prepared.
The novel epitaxial layer structure provided by the invention comprises from bottom to top: a substrate, a GaN buffer layer, an intrinsic GaN layer, a Mg doped P-type GaN layer, an intrinsic GaN channel layer, and an intrinsic AlGaN barrier layer, as shown in fig. 1. This novel epitaxial layer structure has inserted one deck Mg in the intrinsic GaN layer of 2DEG below and has doped P type GaN layer, adopt traditional bars groove etching process, the bars below sculpture is below P-type GaN layer, form the channel of bars below, compare the channel that forms behind traditional epitaxial layer structure removal AlGaN barrier layer, the P-type GaN channel of both sides has been had more in this structure, that is to say, the device is opened completely, not only need the inversion on intrinsic GaN layer, still need the inversion of P-type GaN channel, the threshold voltage of device will be bigger than the enhancement mode device that traditional epitaxial layer structure prepared from this.
According to the technical thought, the simple MOS gate trench type device (as shown in figure 2) based on the novel epitaxial layer structure is subjected to simulation verification by means of a sentourus TCAD simulation tool, the obtained device transfer characteristic is shown in figure 3, and the threshold voltage is about 5V (linear extrapolation extraction), so that the gate trench type device is greatly improved compared with the gate trench type device under the traditional structure, and the feasibility of the invention is verified through preliminary simulation verification. In order to realize the growth of the novel epitaxial layer and ensure the performance of the device, the thickness and doping concentration of the inserted P-type GaN layer need to be reasonably designed, and in addition, the distance between the P-type GaN layer and the GaN channel layer needs to be reasonably designed in order to avoid the influence of the P-type GaN on the GaN channel layer. The influence of the above items is comprehensively considered, and the key layer-by-layer composition and material types of the novel epitaxial layer structure are as follows:
the substrate material is one of the following materials: si, SiC, sapphire.
The doping concentration of the Mg-doped P-type GaN layer is as follows: 5E 16-2E 18cm-3。
The thickness of the Mg-doped P-type GaN layer is 50 nm-300 nm. .
The thickness of the intrinsic GaN channel layer on the Mg-doped P-type GaN layer is as follows: 100nm to 300 nm.
The invention provides a simple and easy-to-realize technological method based on the GaN novel epitaxial layer structure to prepare a GaN enhanced MOSFET, which comprises the following steps:
(1) growing a GaN buffer layer, an intrinsic GaN layer, a Mg-doped P-type GaN layer, an intrinsic GaN channel layer and an intrinsic AlGaN barrier layer on the substrate in sequence;
(2) growing a medium passivation layer on the AlGaN barrier layer by PECVD, ICPCVD or LPCVD;
(3) photoetching a grid pattern, firstly etching the medium passivation layer, then etching the GaN layer until the P-type GaN layer is completely etched, and etching the GaN layer at the temperature of 650-800 ℃ and N2Annealing for 15 minutes in protective gas to activate the P-type GaN;
(4) photoetching and etching (or ion implantation) are carried out on the GaN wafer of the P-type GaN at the position of the annealing activation channel to form an active region table board;
(5) photoetching a GaN wafer with a prepared active region table board, etching a source-drain ohmic electrode region, preparing a plurality of layers of metal through electron beam evaporation or magnetron sputtering to form a source electrode and a drain electrode, and annealing in protective gas at 800-900 ℃ for 30 seconds to form ohmic contact;
(6) after ohmic contact is formed, putting the wafer into atomic layer deposition equipment, growing an insulated gate dielectric layer on the surface of the wafer, then photoetching a source and drain region ohmic contact hole, and removing the insulated gate dielectric layer to expose the source and drain ohmic contact;
(7) and photoetching a gate electrode area, growing a gate electrode material by using electron beam evaporation or magnetron sputtering, then carrying out stripping process treatment on the device to form a gate electrode, and finally carrying out annealing treatment on the whole wafer in a nitrogen environment to finish the preparation of the whole device.
The material of the medium passivation layer in the above process method may be any one of the following materials: si3N4、SiO2、SiON。
In the above process, the source and the drain are: alloys of one or more of titanium, aluminum, nickel, gold, platinum, iridium, molybdenum, tantalum, niobium, cobalt, zirconium, tungsten, and the like.
In the above process, the insulated gate dielectric layer is any one of the following materials: si3N4、Al2O3、AlN、HfO2、SiO2、HfTiO、Sc2O3、Ga2O3、MgO、SiNO。
The gate metal in the above process is a combination of one or more of the following conductive materials: platinum, iridium, nickel, gold, molybdenum, palladium, selenium, beryllium, TiN, polysilicon, ITO.
The invention has the advantages that from the material structure design angle of the compound semiconductor, a novel AlGaN/GaN heterojunction structure is provided, an enhanced device with larger threshold voltage can be realized on the structure by the simplest grid groove etching process, and the absolute turn-off state of the device under zero bias is ensured, so that the problem of the related reliability of the GaN device in practical application is hopefully solved.
Detailed Description
Hereinafter, the fabrication of a gate trench type GaN enhancement device based on the novel epitaxial layer structure proposed by the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings, so that the specific implementation method, process flow and core technical points of the present invention can be more clearly understood. This example is only one implementation of the present invention, i.e., the proposed structure of the present invention should not be limited to the examples set forth herein. The scope of the invention is fully conveyed to those skilled in the art based on this example.
Fig. 1 shows a novel epitaxial layer structure provided by the present invention, which comprises a substrate, a GaN buffer layer, an intrinsic GaN layer, a Mg-doped P-type GaN layer, an intrinsic GaN channel layer, and an intrinsic AlGaN barrier layer from bottom to top. One specific implementation example of the GaN enhancement device fabrication by the gate trench etch process based on this structure includes the following specific steps:
(1) growing a layer of Si on the AlGaN/GaN heterojunction structure wafer shown in the attached figure 1 by PECVD, ICPCVD or LPCVD3N4A passivation layer for improving the reliability of the final device, wherein the cross-sectional view of the structure is shown in FIG. 4;
(2) on the basis of the structure shown in FIG. 4, first, Si in the gate trench region is removed by RIE etching machine3N4Removing GaN in the gate groove region by an ICP etching machine, etching the lower part of the gate to be below the P-type GaN layer to form a channel below the gate, and finally performing N treatment at 650-800 deg.C2Annealing in protective gas for 15 min to activate P-type GaN, and forming a structural cross-sectional view as shown in FIG. 5;
(3) forming an active region, and photoetching and etching (or ion implantation) the GaN wafer of the P-type GaN at the position of the annealed activation channel to form an active region table board;
(4) then, photoetching source-drain ohmic pattern in the active region, and removing Si covering the source-drain ohmic pattern by using RIE etcher3N4Then evaporating Ti/Al/Ni/Au four metals by electron beams, preparing a source-drain ohmic metal electrode by adopting a stripping process, and finally performing rapid annealing for 30 seconds in a nitrogen atmosphere at 870 ℃ to form ohmic contact, wherein the schematic sectional structure diagram is shown in figure 6;
(5) on the basis of the step (4), Al grows on the surface of the wafer2O3An insulated gate dielectric layer forming the structure shown in fig. 7;
(6) removing Al covering the source-drain ohmic contact by wet etching based on the structure shown in FIG. 72O3(as shown in fig. 8), then, growing Ni/Au alloy in the gate area by electron beam evaporation, and then continuing to form a gate metal electrode by using a stripping process to form a T-shaped gate structure, as shown in fig. 9. Finally in N2Annealing the whole wafer in the atmosphere, and annealing at 400 ℃ for 10 min.
(7) Compared with a conventional enhanced device, the enhanced GaN MOSHEMT prepared by the process steps has larger threshold voltage and can ensure the absolute off state degree under zero bias.