An investigation into the reliability of newly proposed MoSi2N4/WSi2N4 field-effect transistors: A Monte Carlo study

Abstract

Recently, the two dimensional complex MA2Z4 structures have been suggested as suitable replacements for silicon channels in field-effect transistors (FETs). Specifically, two materials of MoSi2N4 and WSi2N4 due to their very desirable electrical and thermal properties are noticed. On the other hand, the reliability of transistors, which is determined by the maximum temperature they obtain during the performance, specifies the usefulness of the newly proposed channels for thermal management solution. In this work, the FETs, including MoSi2N4 and WSi2N4 channels, are investigated using Monte Carlo simulation of the phonon Boltzmann equation. In particular, the phonon analysis has been carried out to investigate the peak temperature rise. Our calculations confirm that MoSi2N4 and WSi2N4 present lower maximum temperature than the previously suggested candidate, the blue phosphorene (BP) which itself reaches a shallow temperature. Concretely, the phonon exploration shows that the competition between the dominant heat carrier velocity, and its related frequency settles the maximum temperature value. The material WSi2N4 with much more phonons in TA mode, with almost high velocity and relatively low-frequency, shows adequate thermal condition, and its peak temperature is very low, say 110 K, less than that of BP. The material MoSi2N4 attains the maximum temperature of only 10 K less than BP peak temperature. This behavior attributes to the dominant LA phonons which are fast but also have high frequency and consequently make the temperature get larger than that of the WSi2N4. In summary, WSi2N4, with very low peak temperature, and in the next step MoSi2N4, both with beneficial electrical/thermal properties, are suggested as very suitable candidates for producing more reliable FETs, fulfilling the thermal management.