Stability of GaN HEMT Device Under Static and Dynamic Gate Stress

Abstract

In this work, we investigated the stability of a ${p}$ -GaN gate with high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs) including an internal integrated gate circuit. A circuit was designed to improve ${p}$ -GaN gate stability by using capacitance to release the hole into the ${p}$ -GaN layer to mitigate the threshold voltage shift. Through pulse I-V measurement and positive bias temperature instability (PBTI) test, the carrier transporting behavior in the gate region achieved dynamic equilibrium at 5 V gate bias. The positive gate shift $(\Delta V_{\mathrm{ TH}})$ of 0.4 V is observed with increasing voltage from 3 V to 8 V; $\Delta V_{\mathrm{ TH}}$ initially drops smoothly after release stresses by external capacitance discharge. Finally, integrated passive components and ${p}$ -GaN gate HEMT circuit are recommended to mitigate the $V_{\mathrm{ TH}}$ instability for E-mode HEMT.

Keywords

• p-GaN HEMT
• pulse I-V
• positive bias temperature instability (PBTI)
• threshold voltage
• Stability
• mechanism