Low-Frequency Noise of 4H-SiC CMOS Technology for Analog ICs

Abstract

To design low-noise analog ICs for nuclear power plants, low-frequency noise (LFN) of 4H-SiC CMOS technology was studied in the frequency range of 3 Hz–10 kHz at room temperature. The LFN of the long-channel MOS devices was systematically studied in terms of gate length, gate width, drain current, and drain voltage. It was found to follow the noise model for carrier number fluctuation regardless of conduction type. In addition, the standard deviation of spectral noise density ( <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${S}_{\text {id}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> ) at 10 Hz for the p-channel MOS was experimentally found to be <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$4.6\times $ </tex-math></inline-formula> larger than that for the n-channel MOS. This was caused by the increase in random telegraph noise (RTN) caused by oxide hole traps with nitrogen incorporation at the SiO2/SiC interface. The flicker noise coefficient (KF) in the noise model was estimated to be <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${4.1} \times {10}^{-{26}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> and <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${1.2} \times {10}^{-{27}}\,\,\text{s}^{\text {1-EF}}\text{A}^{\text {2-AF}}\text{F}^{^{^{^{}}}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> for the n- and p-channel MOS, respectively.