Improved Electrical Characteristics of Ge-on-Si Field-Effect Transistors With Controlled Ge Epitaxial Layer Thickness on Si Substrates

The authors report on the novel MOSFETs that were fabricated on thin relaxed Ge epitaxial layers grown on Si substrates. With controlled epi-Ge thickness, selectively activated shallow source/drain (S/D) junctions are formed using low dopant activation energy of Ge. The Ge epitaxial layers determine the effective S/D junction depth by selectively activating S/D implantations only in the Ge layers, while suppressing activation in the Si substrates. Low junction leakage current and capacitance are also achieved by forming S/D junctions in Si substrates as well as in Ge layers with controlled epi-Ge thickness. With this technique applied to Ge-on-Si epitaxial layers, Ge pMOSFETs showed an improvement in short channel effects and junction characteristics.