World Applied Programming, Vol (2), No (2), February 2012.

97-103
ISSN: 2222-2510
2011 WAP journal. www.waprogramming.com

Simulation of Electron Transport in GaN Based MESFET

Using Monte Carlo Method
C. Sayah, B. Bouazza, A. Guen-Bouazza, N. E. Chabane-Sari
Unit de Recherche Matriaux et Energies Renouvelables, Facult des sciences de l'ingnieur,
Universit Abou-Bekr Belkad de Tlemcen.BP 230, Tlemcen 13000, Algrie.
chou28dz@gmail.com
bouaguen@yahoo.fr

Abstract: We performed a two-dimensional Ensemble Monte Carlo simulation of a GaN metal-semiconductor

field effect transistor (MESFET).Scattering processes taken into account are polar optical phonon scattering,
acoustic phonon scattering, piezoelectric scattering, intervalley phonon scattering, non-polar optical phonon
scattering and the ionized impurity scattering. The carrier transport phenomenon in the submicron sized device is
illustrated by the distribution of over 100.000 particles in two dimensional device structure. Channel electrons
can reach velocities that largely exceed the saturation velocity (velocity overshoot). Such effect (enhanced by
reduction of gate length)) guarantees very fast transit times in submicron structures. The electric field is
determined self-consistently from the Poisson equation. Numerical results are presented for a GaN-MESFET.
I.

INTRODUCTION

Gallium nitride has long been considered promising material for electronic and optoelectronic device
applications [1-2-3]. The wide and direct energy gap, large breakdown field, high thermal conductivity, and favorable
electron transport characteristics, make the GaN ideally suited for high-power and high-speed applications. While an
initial effort to study this material was hindered by growth difficulties, recent improvements in the material quality
have made possible the realization of a number of GaN-based devices. In particular, lasers [4], transistors and photo
detectors [5] have been fabricated with these materials. These developments have fueled considerable interest in the
GaN material. In order to analyze and improve the design of GaN-based devices, an understanding of the electron
transport that occurs within these materials is necessary. While electron transport in bulk GaN has been extensively
examined [6-7], the sensitivity of these results to variations in the material parameters has yet to be considered. The
metal semiconductor field effect transistor (MESFET) is one of the most favored devices in the construction of large
scale integrated circuits because of its simplicity of construction, the comparative lack of dopant diffusion problems
and the resultant high packing densities possible. Whilst the preferred semiconductor is still silicon, industry is now
toolings up for wide band gap semiconductors like GaN or SiC production, which offers high electron mobility and
hence the prospect of greater frequency operating rates. Their direct band gap furthermore allows easier integration
with optical devices. For this reason GaN MESFETs have received much attention in the literature, particularly with
respect to their simulation [8-9-10] in an attempt to understand the basic principles of their operation. Monte Carlo
methods have been used to a great extent in this effort because they allow an essentially exact solution of the
Boltzmann transport equation and are subject only to statistical errors, unlike drift diffusion models which cannot
accurately treat the hot-electron effects that are present to a high degree in GaN devices [11]. This paper presents the
results of a Monte Carlo simulation which is used to model electron transport in zinc blende and wurtzite GaN
MESFETs at room temperature.
II.

THE MONTE CARLO SIMULATION OF SEMICONDUCTOR DEVICES

In recent years the ensemble Monte Carlo (EMC) has been widely used to study the properties of
semiconductor devices. Particular emphasis has been lately attributed to submicrometer structures, because of their
performances in switching and high frequency operations. Once the basic physics involved in the transport of such
devices is known, EMC simulation provides a formidable tool to determine their limits and characteristics and can be
very helpful in modeling. Together with the determination of the macroscopic properties of a device, EMC also gives a
microscopic description of the local electric field, charge density, velocity distribution, etc. A flowchart of a generic
EMC self-consistent device simulation is shown in Figure 1. The basic steps are the following:

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C. Sayah, B. Bouazza, A. Guen-Bouazza, N. E. Chabane-Sari, World Applied Programming, Vol (2), No (2), February 2012.

A three-valley model for the conduction band is employed.

The scattering mechanisms considered in our analysis are
ionized impurity, polar and non-polar optical phonon,
piezoelectric and acoustic deformation potential. Intervalley
scattering is also considered.
Set up geometry and discretization scheme-two parameters that
play an important role in the choice of the time step and the grid
size are the plasma frequency and the Debye length.
Charge assignment-the charge of each particle is assigned to a
particular mesh point. Since it is not possible to simulate all the
electrons present in a real device, each simulated particle
represents a cloud of electrons for the purpose of estimating
currents, charge, and field distributions. For all other purposes,
each individual particle carries its elementary charge. The
doping charge is also added to the mesh according to its
distribution.
Potential solution-Poissons equation is solved to determine the
electrostatic potential at the mesh points. In connection to EMC
simulations, a finite difference scheme is generally used.
Flights-Each particle, now treated as an individual electron,
undergoes the standard MC sequence of scatterings and free
flights, subject to the local field previously determined from the
solution of Poissons equation. The MC sequence is stopped at
fixed times, when the field is adjusted following the steps
described above.
The description of the problem is completed by setting initial
and boundary conditions. The initial conditions are not so
important, since only the self-consistent steady state result is
usually retained. Boundary conditions are instead crucial, in
particular in submicrometer devices, where contact properties
drastically influence the whole behavior of the device.

The purpose of this work is to compare, using Monte Carlo simulation, the potentialities of wurtzite GaN (wGaN) and zinc blende GaN (c-GaN) for very short gate length FETs. We first analyse, in Section 3, the electronic
transport properties of both c-GaN and w-GaN. In particular, the velocity-field characteristic associated with this
material will be examined in detail. Then, an overview of our steady-state electron transport results, corresponding to
the three III-V nitride semiconductors under consideration in this analysis, will be given, and a comparison with the
more conventional III-V compound semiconductor, GaAs will be presented. A comparison between the temperature
dependence of the velocity-field characteristics associated with GaN will then be presented, and our Monte Carlo
results will be used to account for the differences in behavior. A similar analysis will be presented for the doping
dependence, and the results of transient transport simulations are discussed in section 3. In Section 4, using 2D Monte
Carlo device simulation, we compare the physical behavior and predicted performance of c-GaN and w-GaN based
MESFETs with very short gate lengths.
III.

ELECTRON TRANSPORT IN C-GAN AND W-GAN

We first investigate the evolution of the low field mobility, at room temperature, as a function of the doping
concentration, ranging from 1.1016 to 1018 cm-3. The results are presented in Figure 2. On the whole range of doping
concentrations; the low field mobility presents higher values for c-GaN as compared with w-GaN. This is largely due
to the higher

valley effective mass in the wurtzite phase(0.15 m0 for c-GaN versus 0.2 m0 for w-GaN).

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C. Sayah, B. Bouazza, A. Guen-Bouazza, N. E. Chabane-Sari, World Applied Programming, Vol (2), No (2), February 2012.

Figure 3: Steady state electron velocity as a function of

electric field in GaN and GaAs.

Figure2:Electron mobility in c-GaN and w-GaN as a

functionofdoping concentrationat room temperature.

In Figure 3, the simulated electron drift velocity is plotted as function of applied electric field in c-GaN and
w-GaN. Lattice temperature is 300 K, and electron concentration is equal to 1016 cm-3. First, it can be seen in this
figure that for electric fields higher than 20 kV cm-1, both GaN materials exhibit higher electron velocity values than
for more conventional semiconductors such as GaAs. On the other hand, c-GaN shows higher velocity values than wGaN almost in the whole range of electric fields. The threshold field which produces the highest steady state velocity
is 110 kV cm-1 for c-GaN and 170 kV cm-1 for w-GaN. While GaAs exhibits a much higher low-field mobility, for
comparable selections of temperature and doping, its peak drift velocity is only 2.2 x107 cm s-1, this peak occurring at
a much lower electric field, 5 kV cm-1,and the corresponding saturation drift velocity being only around 0.8 x107cm s-1.
The drift velocity is plotted in Figures 4 and 5 function of applied electric field in c-GaN and w-GaN with temperature
as a parameter. For the calculations a fixed doping concentration of 1 x1017 cm-3 was used. It is well known that
temperature plays a decisive role in influencing the velocity-field characteristics of semiconductors occur. We note
that the form of the velocity-field characteristic changes substantially as the temperature is increased. In particular, the
peak drift velocity and the saturation drift velocity are found to decrease substantially with increased temperatures. It
is interesting to note that the low field mobility increases as the temperature is lowered, whereas, the saturation
velocity shows a less pronounced temperature dependence. This can be explained by noting that under low field
conditions, scattering is dominated by acoustic phonons, ionized impurity, and polar optical phonon absorption which
are all suppressed at lower temperatures leading to the improvement in mobility. At low fields for temperatures up to
300 K the hump in the velocity field characteristics is due to impurity scattering. At elevated temperatures the hump
disappears due to the dominance of polar optical phonon scattering along with a drastic reduction in impurity
scattering. The high field transport, on the other hand, is dominated by polar optical phonon and intervalley scatterings
that have weak lattice temperature dependence. The position of the peak velocity moves and decreases from about 3.2
x 107cm s-1 at 150 K to about 2 x 107 cm s-1 at 1000 K for c-GaN and 3.0 x 107 cms-1 at 150 K to about 1.9 x 107 cm s-1
at 1000 K for w-GaN. Increased temperatures are also seen to soften the sharpness of the peak, in addition to
decreasing the saturation drift velocity, the saturation drift velocity ranging from about 2.1 x 107 cm s-l at 150 K to
about 1.4 x 107 cm s-1 at 1000 K for c-GaN and 2.2 x 107 cm s-1 at 150 K to about 1.5 x 107 cm s-1 at 1000 K for wGaN.

Figure5: The dependence of the velocity-field characteristic

associated with w-GaN on the temperature.

Figure 4: The dependence of the velocity-field

characteristic associated with c-GaN on the temperature.

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C. Sayah, B. Bouazza, A. Guen-Bouazza, N. E. Chabane-Sari, World Applied Programming, Vol (2), No (2), February 2012.

However, just as in the case of GaN and InN, these effects are mild when contrasted with the case of GaAs; in the case
of GaAs, for a doping concentration of 1 x 1017cm-3 , our Monte Carlo simulations show that the peak drift velocity
decreases from about 2.2 x 107 cm s-1 at 150 K to about 2.5 x 106 cm s-1 at 1000 K, the corresponding saturation drift
velocity decreasing from 1.4x 107 cm s-1 at 150 K to about 2.2 x106 cm s-l at 1000 K. This is due to the fact that AlN,
GaN and InN, have relatively large polar optical phonon energies, 99.2, 91.2 and 89.0 meV, respectively, when
compared with GaAs, 35 meV, as well as relatively large intervalley energy separations [12]. Figure 6 and 7 shows the
variation of the steady-state drift velocity as a function of the applied electric field for three different ionized impurity
concentrations at room temperature for c-GaN and w-GaN.

The influence of doping becomes particularly noticeable for doping concentrations in excess of 1 x1018 cm-3; the peak
and saturation drift velocities decreasing markedly with further doping. The velocity-field characteristic remains
essentially unchanged for doping concentrations less than 1 x 1017 cm-3. The position of the peak velocity moves and
decreases from about 3.1x107 cm s-1 at 1 x1017 cm-3 to about 2.85 X 107 cm s-1 at 1 x 1019 cm-3 for c-GaN and 2.88x107
cm s-1 at1 x1017 cm-3 to about 2.67x107 cm s-1 at 1 x 1019 cm-3 for w-GaN. A corresponding decrease in the saturation
drift velocity is also noted, this velocity decreasing from about 1.95x107 cm s-1 at 1 x 1017 cm-3 to about 1.87x107 cm
s-1 at 1 x1019 cm-3for c-GaN and 1.95x107 cm s-1 at 1 x1017 cm-3 to about 1.87x107 cm s-1 at 1 x1019 cm-3for w-GaN; a
slight upward curvature in the velocity-field characteristic of c-GaN doped at 1 x 1017 cm-3 is noticed for electric fields
in excess of 300 kV cm-1. The velocity-field characteristics associated with the III-V nitride semiconductors under
Figure 8.of the velocity-field
consideration in this analysis GaN, AlN, and InN are contrasted with thatFigure
of GaAs
7: Theindependence
Figure 6: The dependence of the velocity-field
characteristic associated with c-GaN on the doping
concentration.

characteristic associated with w-GaN on the doping

concentration.

Figure 8:A comparison of the velocityfield characteristics associated with the IIIV
nitride semiconductors, GaN, AlN, and InN, with that associated with GaAs.

We see that each of these III-V compound semiconductors achieves a peak in its velocity-field characteristic. InN

achieves the highest steady-state peak electron drift velocity,

100

at an applied electric field of

C. Sayah, B. Bouazza, A. Guen-Bouazza, N. E. Chabane-Sari, World Applied Programming, Vol (2), No (2), February 2012.

. This contrasts with the case of GaN,

at 140 kV/cm, and that of AlN,

at
. For GaAs, the peak electron drift velocity of
occurs
at a much lower applied electric field than that for the III-V nitride semiconductors (only 4 kV
).In very short
gate length FETs, the electric fields vary very abruptly under the gate and non-stationary effects are likely to occur
[13-14]. To investigate these effects, we simulate bulk GaN materials for a variety of applied electric field strengths.
The evolution versus time and distance of the mean electron velocity is presented in Figures 9, 10, 11 and 12, for cGaN and w-GaN. For large electric fields, velocity overshoot is obtained, as already reported for other III-V
semiconductors [15]. This velocity overshoot only occurs at field strengths larger than the threshold field,
corresponding to the steady state peak velocity
for c-GaN and
for w-GaN).
For a given electric field, velocity overshoot is more pronounced in c-GaN than in w-GaN. To summarize this part, all
the electron transport properties (mobility, steady state velocity, velocity overshoot) are at the advantage of c-GaN,
which seems to be the best candidate for FETs operating at high frequency. We shall try to confirm this point in the
next section.

Figure10: Transient electron velocity as a function of the

distance in c-GaN for various applied electric-field strength.

Figure9: Transient electron velocity as a function of time in

c-GaN for various applied electric-field strength.

Figure 12: Transient electron velocity as a function of the

distance in w-GaN for various applied electric-field strength.

Figure11: Transient electron velocity as a function of time

in w-GaN for various applied electric-field strength.

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IV.

MONTE CARLO SIMULATION OF GAN BASED DEVICES

We investigate the potentialities of GaN based FETs using a 2D Monte Carlo device simulator. This simulator is based
on a Monte Carlo model for bulk GaN coupled with a 2D Poisson solver with appropriate geometrical and electrical
boundary conditions. We simulate two identical MESFET structures, the first one based on zinc blende material, the
other one on wurtzite material. Figure 13 shows the cross-sectional structure of simulated GaN MESFET. The overall
device length is

in the x-direction and the device has a

gate length and

length. The donor densities are chosen as

and
characteristics are presented in Figure 14 for both c-GaN and w-GaN MESFET.

source and drain

.The computed Ids(Vds, Vgs)

Figure 14: Comparison of electrical characteristics Ids(Vds, Vgs) of c-GaN and w-GaN MESFET.

The characteristics of the drain current (ID) versus drain-source voltage (VDS) are obtained by Monte Carlo simulations
in the range of gate-source voltages from 0 to -5 V. The obtained characteristics are almost identical in shape. As can
be seen from Figure 14, the drain current is higher in the c-GaN MESFET than inthe w-GaN MESFET. Nevertheless,
for both structures, high drain current densities are obtained, confirming that GaN MESFETs are good candidates for
high power applications. Moreover, due to the better electronic transport properties in zinc blende GaN, the c-GaN
based MESFET exhibits a 50% higher drain current density as compared with the w-GaN MESFET.
V.

CONCLUSIONS

We have studied calculations and comparisons of the steady-state, velocity-field, mobility characteristics of
zinc blende GaN (c-GaN) and wurtzite GaN (w-GaN), determined using Monte Carlo simulation. The calculations
showed the existence of a negative differential resistance (NDR) region with threshold field of 110 and 170 kV/cm for
the zinc blende and wurtzite GaN phases, respectively. The sensitivity of these steady-state results to variations in
temperature and doping concentration is examined and found to be much less than that which occurs in GaAs.
Preliminary results show that it is only the saturation drift velocity that is affected by these variations in parameters.
All the electron transport properties (mobility, steady state velocity) are at the advantage of c-GaN. Then, The Monte
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Carlo technique has been used to compare the potentialities of c-GaN and w-GaN short gate length FETs. The wurtzite
GaN also has its advantages: speed of saturation higher than that of the cubic form [16-13]. Foutz and other [17]
estimate for a distance of a microphone, the minimum transit time is approximately 3picoseconds for gallium nitride
(GaN) and around 5.4 picoseconds for gallium arsenide (GaAs). The optimal cutoff frequency for a device
manufactured by the GaN is about 50 GHz, it is 30 GHz for GaAs. We find that both materials are good candidates for
high frequency and high power operations and that zinc blende GaN, although more difficult to grow, allows a 50%
gain in FET performance as compared with wurtzite GaN.
Among the group-III nitrides, InN displays markedly unusual electronic transport characteristics due to its smaller
effective mass, high peak velocity and high background electron concentration [18].Our results suggest that the
transport characteristics of indium nitride are superior to those of gallium nitride and gallium arsenide, over a wide
range of temperatures, from 77 to 600 K, and doping concentrations, up to
. Hence, indium nitride has
considerable potential for device applications[18].All these results are in very good agreement with Monte Carlo
results obtained using Dessenne [13], Brennan [19-20] and Foutz [12-21] only recently.
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