Liquid-helium temperature operation of silicon-germanium heterojunction bipolar transistors

John D. Cressler; Alvin J. Joseph; David M. Richey; James H. Comfort; David L. Harame; Emmanuel F. Crabbe; Johannes M. C. Stork

doi:10.1117/12.178491

23 June 1994 Liquid-helium temperature operation of silicon-germanium heterojunction bipolar transistors

John D. Cressler, Alvin J. Joseph, David M. Richey, James H. Comfort, David L. Harame, Emmanuel F. Crabbe, Johannes M. C. Stork

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 2226, Infrared Readout Electronics II; (1994) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.178491
Event: SPIE's International Symposium on Optical Engineering and Photonics in Aerospace Sensing, 1994, Orlando, FL, United States

Abstract

We present the first measurements of silicon-generated (SiGe) heterojunction bipolar transistors (HBT) in the liquid-helium temperature regime. We have measured the dc characteristics of SiGe HBTs from two different profile designs over the temperature range of 300 K - 4 K. The first SiGe HBT design was optimized for high-speed digital applications at room temperature (`i-p-i' SiGe HBT), and the second SiGe HBT design was specifically optimized for cryogenic operation (`emitter-cap' SiGe HBT). A silicon bipolar junction transfer (Si BJT) which has a doping profile similar to the i-p-i SiGe HBT is used as a control. The devices continue to exhibit transistor action down to the liquid-helium temperature regime, even in the presence of strong carrier freeze-out in the neutral base and collector regimes. In contrast to the Si BJT, the peak current gain of the optimized emitter-cap SiGe HBT rises monotonically from 100 to 300 K to nearly 2000 at 16 K, although parasitic base current leakage limits the useful operating range to collector currents above about 1.0 (mu) A. At very low-injection levels (less than 1.0 nA) below 77 K, we identify a non- diffusive transport mechanism in the collector current of both SiGe HBTs and the Si BJT which is unaccounted for in conventional device theory. Initial calculations suggest that this phenomenon has a bias and temperature dependence characteristic of a carrier tunneling process.

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John D. Cressler, Alvin J. Joseph, David M. Richey, James H. Comfort, David L. Harame, Emmanuel F. Crabbe, and Johannes M. C. Stork "Liquid-helium temperature operation of silicon-germanium heterojunction bipolar transistors", Proc. SPIE 2226, Infrared Readout Electronics II, (23 June 1994); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.178491

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