Electrical properties of HfTiON gate-dielectric metal-oxide-semiconductor capacitors with different Si-surface nitridations

Abstract

Electrical properties of HfTiON gate-dielectric metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) capacitors with different Si-surface nitridations in N2 O, NO, and N H3 prior to high- k film deposition are investigated and compared. It is found that the NO-nitrided sample exhibits low interface-state density and gate leakage current, and high reliability. This is attributed to formation of a SiON interlayer with suitable proportions of N and O. The MOS capacitor with Hf0.4 Ti0.6 Ox Ny SiON gate dielectric stack (capacitance equivalent thickness of 1.52 nm and k value of 18.9) prepared by NO surface nitridation has an interface-state density of 1.22× 1011 cm-2 eV-1 and gate leakage current density of 6× 10-4 A cm-2 (Vg =1 V). Moreover, only a small degradation of electrical properties after a stressing at 10 MVcm for 3000 s is observed for the NO-nitrided sample. © 2007 American Institute of Physics.