Carrier and heat transport properties of poly-crystalline GeSn films for thin-film transistor applications

Abstract

Thin-film transistors (TFTs) on insulator substrates are widely used in applications from liquid crystal displays to sensor devices. However, insulator substrates with low heat conductivity lead to unfavorable self-heating effects in the channel regions. Herein, the carrier and heat transport properties of polycrystalline GeSn films on SiO2/Si substrates were improved by suppressing Sn segregation in the films to fabricate GeSn channel TFTs. Alloying with 5.5% Sn enabled the formation of larger grains than those in poly-Ge films after low-temperature annealing (below 520 °C) without Sn segregation. In addition, the films had a hole mobility of 40 cm2 V−1 s−1 at a hole density of 1.1 × 1018 cm−3 and a thermal conductivity of 12.1 Wm−1 K−1 at room temperature. The temperature dependences of the carrier and heat transport properties of the poly-GeSn films were investigated to accurately simulate a device with a poly-GeSn channel TFT. This was achieved by using the carrier transport measurements and numerical simulations of the heat transport in the Debye model. The simulated device allowed an accurate assessment of the self-heating effects of the TFT and thus provides a design guide for TFTs.