Next generation electronics on the ultrawide-bandgap aluminum nitride platform

Gallium nitride high-electron-mobility transistors (GaN HEMTs) are at a point of rapid growth in defense (radar, SATCOM) and commercial (5G and beyond) industries. This growth also comes at a point at which the standard GaN heterostructures remain unoptimized for maximum performance. For this reason...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inSemiconductor science and technology Vol. 36; no. 4; p. 44001
Main Authors Hickman, Austin Lee, Chaudhuri, Reet, Bader, Samuel James, Nomoto, Kazuki, Li, Lei, Hwang, James C M, Grace Xing, Huili, Jena, Debdeep
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published 01.04.2021
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Summary:Gallium nitride high-electron-mobility transistors (GaN HEMTs) are at a point of rapid growth in defense (radar, SATCOM) and commercial (5G and beyond) industries. This growth also comes at a point at which the standard GaN heterostructures remain unoptimized for maximum performance. For this reason, we propose the shift to the aluminum nitride (AlN) platform. AlN allows for smarter, highly-scaled heterostructure design that will improve the output power and thermal management of III-nitride amplifiers. Beyond improvements over the incumbent amplifier technology, AlN will allow for a level of integration previously unachievable with GaN electronics. State-of-the-art high-current p-channel FETs, mature filter technology, and advanced waveguides, all monolithically integrated with an AlN/GaN/AlN HEMT, is made possible with AlN. It is on this new AlN platform that nitride electronics may maximize their full high-power, high-speed potential for mm-wave communication and high-power logic applications.
ISSN:0268-1242
1361-6641
DOI:10.1088/1361-6641/abe5fd