Device Principles of High-K Dielectrics

Abstract

The growth of the semiconductor industr yi nt he last few decades has largely been driven by the growth of integrated circuits (IC) based on complementary metal– oxide–semiconductor (CMOS) technology. CMOS technology uses n-type and p-type field effect transistors (FETs) to produce digita ll ogi ce lements that are superior to other available logic technologies for many applications. The dominance of CMOS ove ro t her logic technologies is based on its low power consumption as well as the ability to scale CMOS and achieve simultaneous improvements in power consumption, speed and cost. One of the key aspects of CMOS technology is the metal–oxide– semiconductor (MOS) capacitor that acts as the control element in a CMOS device. While there are other semiconductors that have either been used before silicon or may have better material properties than silicon, silicon has become by far the dominant materia li nt he semiconductor industry mainly due to its native oxide, silicon dioxide (SiO2), and the MOS capacitor that can be easily manufactured on silicon using this oxide. The properties of silicon dioxid ea n di ts interface to silicon are far superior t ot he native oxides on other commonly available semiconductors and enabl et he implementation of high performance CMOS.