Ultra-low temperature radio-frequency performance of partially depleted silicon-on-insulator n-type metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistors with tunnel diode body contact structures

Abstract

Radio-frequency (RF) characteristics under ultra-low temperature of multi-finger partially depleted silicon-on-insulator (PD SOI) n-type metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistors (nMOSFETs) with tunnel diode body-contact (TDBC) structure and T-gate body-contact (TB) structure are investigated in this paper. When operating at 77 K, TDBC device suppresses floating-body effect (FBE) as well as the TB device. For TB device and TDBC device, cut-off frequency (fT) improves as the temperature decreases to liquid-helium temperature (77 K) while that of the maximum oscillation frequency (fMAX) is opposite due to the decrease of the unilateral power gain. While operating under 77 K, fT and fMAX of TDBC device reach to 125 GHz and 77 GHz, representing 8% and 15% improvements compared with those of TB device, respectively, which is mainly due to the lower parasitic resistances and capacitances. The results indicate that TDBC SOI MOSFETs could be considered as promising candidates for analog and RF applications over a wide range of temperatures and there is immense potential for the development of RF CMOS integrated circuits for cryogenic applications.