Capacitance-Voltage (CV) Characterization of GaAs-Oxide Interfaces

We will shortly review the basic physics of charge carrier trapping and emission from trapping states within the bandgap of a semiconductor in order to show that high temperature CV-measurements are necessary for GaAs MOS characterization. The mid-gap trapping states in GaAs have characteristic emission times of the order of 1000 seconds, which makes them extremely complicated to measure at room temperature. Higher substrate temperatures speed up these emission times, which makes measurements of the mid-gap traps possible with standard CV-measurements. CV-characterizations of GaAs/Al2O3, GaAs/Gd2O3, GaAs/HfO2 and In0.15Ga0.85As/Al2O3 interfaces show the existence of four interface state peaks, independent of the gate oxide deposited: a hole trap peak close to the valence band, a hole trap peak close to mid-gap energies, an electron trap peak close to mid-gap energies and an electron trap peak close to the conduction band.