Recent Advances in Negative Capacitance FinFETs for Low-Power Applications: A Review.

Abstract

In the contemporary era of Internet-of-Things (IoT), there is an extensive search for competent devices which can operate at ultralow voltage supply. Due to the restriction of power dissipation, a reduced sub-threshold swing-based device appears to be the perfect solution for efficient computation. To counteract this issue, negative capacitance fin field-effect transistors (NC-FinFETs) came up as the next-generation platform to withstand the aggressive scaling of transistors. The ease of fabrication, process-integration, higher current driving capability, and ability to tailor the short-channel effects (SCEs) are some of the potential advantages offered by NC-FinFETs that attracted the attention of researchers worldwide. The following review emphasizes how this new state-of-art technology supports the persistence of Moore's law and addresses the ultimate limitation of Boltzmann tyranny by offering a sub-threshold slope (SS) below 60 mV/decade. The article primarily focuses on two parts: 1) the theoretical background of negative capacitance (NC) effect and FinFET devices and 2) the recent progress done in the field of NC-FinFETs. It also highlights the crucial areas that need to be upgraded, to mitigate the challenges faced by this technology and the future prospects of such devices.