Interactions of hydrogen with amorphous hafnium oxide

We used density functional theory (DFT) calculations to study the interaction of hydrogen with amorphous hafnia (a-HfO₂) using a hybrid exchange-correlation functional. Injection of atomic hydrogen, its diffusion towards electrodes, and ionization can be seen as key processes underlying charge instability of high-permittivity amorphous hafnia layers in many applications. Hydrogen in many wide band gap crystalline oxides exhibits negative-U behavior (+1 and -1 charged states are thermodynamically more stable than the neutral state) . Our results show that in a-HfO₂ hydrogen is also negative-U, with charged states being the most thermodynamically stable at all Fermi level positions. However, metastable atomic hydrogen can share an electron with intrinsic electron trapping precursor sites [Phys. Rev. B 94, 020103 (2016).] forming a [eₜᵣ^-+O--H] center, which is lower in energy on average by about 0.2 eV. These electron trapping sites can affect both the dynamics and thermodynamics of the interaction of hydrogen with a-HfO₂ and the electrical behavior of amorphous hafnia films in CMOS devices.