Investigation of trapping effects in AlGaN/GaN/Si field-effect transistors by frequency dependent capacitance and conductance analysis

We report on frequency dependent capacitance and conductance analysis of the AlGaN/GaN/Si heterostructure field-effect transistors (HFETs) and Al2O3/AlGaN/GaN/Si metal-oxide-semiconductor HFETs (MOSHFETs) in order to investigate the trap effects in these devices. The capacitance of the HFETs exhibits significantly higher frequency dispersion than that of the MOSHFETs. Two different types of traps were found from the conductance analysis on both types of devices, fast with the time constant τ≅(0.1–1) μs and slow with τ=8 ms. The density of trap states evaluated on the HFETs was DT≅2.5×1012 and up to 1013 cm−2 eV−1 for the fast and slow traps, respectively. Analysis of the MOSHFETs yielded only slightly lower DT of the fast traps (≅1.5×1012 cm−2 eV−1), but nearly two orders of magnitude lower density of slow traps (≤4×1011 cm−2 eV−1) than those of the HFETs. This indicates an effective passivation of slow surface related traps but less influence on fast (probably bulk related) trapping states by applying an insulator on the AlGaN/GaN HFET.