Impact of The ge Content on The Radiation Hardness of Hetero-Junction Diodes in Sige Strained Layers

Abstract

AbstractThe degradation of the electrical performance of strained Si1-xGex epitaxial diodes by 220-MeV carbon particles is reported and compared with the effect of 20-MeV alpha rays and 20-MeV protons. The macroscopic damage is studied in a broad fluence range and for different Ge contents, ranging from 8 to 16 %. It is shown that the radiation damage of carbon irradiated diodes is about one order of magnitude larger than that for alpha ray irradiation, which can be explained by considering the difference of the nonionizing energy loss (NIEL). It is observed that the reverse current at a fixed bias increases with increasing fluence, while the rate of increase decreases with increasing fluence and/or Ge content. The fact that a close to square root dependence exists between the boron deactivation in the diode depletion region, derived from capacitance-voltage measurements and the reverse current increase suggests that the device degradation is dominated by radiation induced deep levels associated with interstitial boron complexes.