Chemical and electronic passivation of 4H-SiC surface by hydrogen-nitrogen mixed plasma

Abstract

We propose a low-temperature electron cyclotron resonance microwave hydrogen-nitrogen mixed plasma treatment method for passivating 4H-SiC surface and investigate the effects of treatment on the structural, chemical, and electronic properties of the surface. The results indicate that the method is highly controllable and could result in an atomically ordered, unreconstructed, smooth, and clean SiC surface. The absence of surface band bending is indicative of an electronically passivated SiC surface with a surface state density as low as 5.47 × 1010 cm−2. This effect could be attributed to the simultaneous effects of H and N passivating on SiC surface.