Analysis of Different Piezoelectric Materials on the Film Bulk Acoustic Wave Resonator

Abstract

The performance of film bulk acoustic wave resonators (FBAR) is greatly dependent on the choice of piezoelectric materials. Different piezoelectric materials have distinct properties that can impact the performance of FBAR. Hence, this work presents the analysis of three different piezoelectric materials which are aluminum nitride (AlN), scandium aluminum nitride (ScAlN) and zinc oxide (ZnO) on the performance of FBARs working at resonance frequencies of   6 GHz until 10 GHz. The one-dimensional (1-D) modelling is implemented to characterize the effects of these materials on the quality (Q) factor, electromechanical coupling coefficient (k2eff) and bandwidth (BW). It is determined that employing ScAlN in FBAR results in the highest Q factor, ranges from 628 to 1047 while maintaining a relatively compact area (25 µm × 25 µm) and thickness (430 nm to 720 nm). However, ScAlN yields the narrowest BW, measuring 0.11 GHz at 6 GHz, as opposed to AlN and ZnO, which exhibit broader bandwidths of 0.16 GHz and 0.23 GHz, respectively.