Highly radiation-tolerant polymer field-effect transistors with polystyrene dielectric layer

Abstract

There is high demand for radiation-tolerant devices for use in electronic applications in extreme irradiation environments, but conventional silicon transistors cannot satisfy the device requirements. In this work, we systematically investigated the total ionizing dose (TID) responses of polymer field-effect transistors (PFETs). By selecting suitable polymer gate dielectric materials (especially PS), it is found that these PFETs show significantly improved tolerances to the TID. Specifically, a PFET fabricated using polystyrene as its gate dielectric layer can maintain more than 95% of its electrical performance even after exposure to a TID of 7.5 Mrad (SiO2). The irradiated device has a long shelf lifetime that exceeds 1000 days. Simple inverter circuits were also fabricated and also demonstrated tolerance to a high TID of 7.5 Mrad. This work provides a possible solution for the development of PFETs for applications in extreme irradiation environments.