A Study of The Hole Barrier of Kanthal on Silicon Using Current – Voltage Characteristics
- April 28, 2023
- Posted by: RSIS
- Categories: Engineering, IJRIAS
International Journal of Research and Innovation in Applied Science (IJRIAS) |Volume VIII, Issue IV, April 2023|ISSN 2454-6194
A Study of The Hole Barrier of Kanthal on Silicon Using Current – Voltage Characteristics
S. P. Kashinje
St. Joseph University in Tanzania, College of Engineering and Technology (SJCET), P. O. Box 11007, Dar Es Salaam, TANZANIA
DOI: https://doi.org/10.51584/IJRIAS.2023.8406
Received: 28 October 2022; Accepted: 17 November 2022; Published: 28 April 2023
Abstract: – We report fabrication of a kanthal pSi diode and a study of its hole barrier by Current – Voltage characteristics. The diode fabrication was done by sputter-depositing a kanthal film on a single crystalline p – type Si in the <111> orientation. Kanthal is a metal alloy consisting of 70.6% Iron, 24.1% Chromium, 4.8% Aluminum and 0. 5% Co. The hole barrier on kanthal was determined by I – V characteristics to be ФBh=0.66±0.03 eV. The Rutherford Back Scattering Analysis shows that the composition of the sputtered kanthal films and the parent target are the same.
Key Words: Kanthal, p – type silicon, Barrier height, Sputtering, Thin Solid Films, Diodes, Rectifier, Ohmic.
I. Introduction
Metal-semiconductor interfaces are of crucial importance in all types of solid state devices. In this paper we report a study on a metal –semiconductor in which kanthal was deposited by sputtering technique on p-silicon.
In this study Kanthal was deposited by rf sputtering a kanthal target on p – Si. Kanthal is a metal alloy consisting of 70.6% Iron, 24.1% Chromium, 4.8% Aluminum and 0.5% Cobalt. The sputtered kanthal films on Si are very stable and do not corrode, even though the major parent element Iron is highly corrosive as they can produce durable and stable devices.
The barrier height of kanthal films can be very useful for solid state devices, hybrid and integrated electronics.
In view of these possible applications, the hole barrier of Kanthal on Si was studied. The barrier height is an important property of a diode since it determines whether the diode will be a rectifier or ohmic.
After fabrication of the diodes, the barrier was determined using both the forward and reverse I – V characteristics. The method of I-V characteristics is described in the next section.
II. Materials and Methods
2.1 Barrier Height Determination
There are two methods which can be used to measure the barrier height of a diode using I-V characteristics. These are: the forward I-V characteristics and the reverse I-V characteristics [Sze 1981].
The forward I-V characteristics are obtained for a metal-semiconductor (MS) interface when the metal is negatively biased. The current equation is then given by:
