Article Title

High performance ring oscillators from 10-nm wide silicon nanowire field-effect transistors

Authors

Ruo-Gu Huang, Department of Electrical Engineering, California Institute of Technology, MC 136-93, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
Douglas Tham, Division of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, California Institute of Technology, MC 127-72, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
Dunwei Wang, Department of Chemistry, Boston College, 140 Commonwealth Ave, Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts 02467, USA
James R. Heath, Division of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, California Institute of Technology, MC 127-72, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA

Keywords

Silicon nanowire (SiNW), field-effect transistor (FET), surface treatment, inverter, ring oscillator

Abstract

ABSTRACT We explore 10-nm wide Si nanowire (SiNW) field-effect transistors (FETs) for logic applications, via the fabrication and testing of SiNW-based ring oscillators. We report on SiNW surface treatments and dielectric annealing, for producing SiNW FETs that exhibit high performance in terms of large on/off-state current ratio (~108), low drain-induced barrier lowering (~30 mV) and low subthreshold swing (~80 mV/decade). The performance of inverter and ring-oscillator circuits fabricated from these nanowire FETs are also explored. The inverter demonstrates the highest voltage gain (~148) reported for a SiNW-based NOT gate, and the ring oscillator exhibits near rail-to-rail oscillation centered at 13.4 MHz. The static and dynamic characteristics of these NW devices indicate that these SiNW-based FET circuits are excellent candidates for various high-performance nanoelectronic applications.

Graphical Abstract

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-011-0157-2

Publisher

Tsinghua University Press

Recommended Citation

Ruo-Gu Huang,Douglas Tham,Dunwei Wang,James R. Heath, High performance ring oscillators from 10-nm wide silicon nanowire field-effect transistors. NanoRes.2011, 4(10): 1005–1012