Effect of Back-Channel Surface on Reliability of Solution-Processed In0.51Ga0.15Zn0.34O Thin-Film Transistors with Thin Active Layer

Hwarim Im; Jeong Hyun Ahn; Yong-Sang Kim; Yongtaek Hong

doi:10.1021/acsami.2c18393

Effect of Back-Channel Surface on Reliability of Solution-Processed In_0.51Ga_0.15Zn_0.34O Thin-Film Transistors with Thin Active Layer

ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2022 Dec 21;14(50):55821-55827. doi: 10.1021/acsami.2c18393. Epub 2022 Dec 8.

Authors

Hwarim Im¹, Jeong Hyun Ahn¹, Yong-Sang Kim¹, Yongtaek Hong²

Affiliations

¹ Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Sungkyunkwan University, Suwon16419, South Korea.
² Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Inter-University Semiconductor Research Center, Seoul National University, Seoul151-742, South Korea.

PMID: 36480162
DOI: 10.1021/acsami.2c18393

Abstract

We have investigated the degradation mechanism of solution-processed indium-gallium-zinc-oxide (IGZO) thin-film transistors. The threshold voltage shift (ΔV_th) followed a linear function under negative gate bias stress (NBS), while it showed a stretched-exponential behavior under positive gate bias stress. The slope of ΔV_th for stress time was rarely changed with variations below 0.3 mV/s. The thickness of the fabricated IGZO layer (In_0.51Ga_0.15Zn_0.34O) was approximately 10 nm. The Debye length (L_D) was larger than IGZO thickness (t_IGZO) due to the fully depleted active layer under NBS. Therefore, the degradation phenomenon under NBS was related to the adsorption at back-channel surface. The back-channel surface could be affected by the gate bias under NBS, and the molecules adsorbed at the IGZO layer were positively charged and induced extra electrons by NBS. We verified that the number of positively charged adsorbates had a proportional relationship with the ΔV_th based on the two-dimensional technology computer-aided design (TCAD) simulation. Furthermore, we investigated the degradation phenomenon with the ΔV_th equation regarding the adsorbates, and the result confirmed that the adsorption process could cause the linear ΔV_th. We experimentally confirmed the effect of back-channel surface by comparing the ΔV_th between different atmospheric conditions and L_D. Consequently, the reaction at the back-channel surface should be considered to develop the metal-oxide semiconductor devices.

Keywords: Debye length; adsorption; back-channel surface; reliability; solution-processed IGZO TFT.