Current Applied Physics 11 (2011) 1015e1019

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Current Applied Physics

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/cap

Contact resistance dependent scaling-down behavior of amorphous InGaZnO

thin-film transistors
Edward Namkyu Cho, Jung Han Kang, Ilgu Yun*
Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, 262 Seongsanno, Seodaemun-gu, Yonsei University, Seoul 120-749, Republic of Korea

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Here, we report scaling effects on the electrical properties of amorphous InGaZnO (a-IGZO) thin-film
Received 8 September 2010 transistors (TFTs). The a-IGZO TFTs had same channel width/length ratio (W/L ¼ 20), but different
Received in revised form channel lengths (L ¼ 20, 10, 5, and 2.5 mm). To examine the scaling-down behaviors, short-channel effects
7 December 2010
and contact resistance of the TFTs were investigated. As the channel length decreased, apparent shift of
Accepted 17 January 2011
threshold voltage (Vth) and degradation of subthreshold swing (SSUB) were shown. In addition, it is also
Available online 28 January 2011
found that the field-effect mobility (mFE) was degraded as the channel length was decreased which was
originated from contact resistance. Due to this contact resistance effect, drain current (IDS) was decreased
Keywords:
InGaZnO
for short-channel devices.
Thin-film transistors Ó 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Short-channel effects
Contact resistance

1. Introduction short-channel effects and contact resistance which both could not
be neglected in the short-channel devices are investigated.
Transparent oxide thin-film transistors (TFTs) are of great
interest for the applications in flat-panel displays, optical sensors, 2. Test device structures
and solar cells [1e4]. Recently, transparent ZnO based TFTs have
attracted much attention for flexible displays because they can be a-IGZO TFT test structures were fabricated on a glass substrate
fabricated on plastic substrates at low temperature and have the with 250-nm Mo gate metal deposited by sputtering. The 200-nm
ability to be used to produce highly uniform and large area displays SiOx layer was then deposited as a gate dielectric by plasma
with a low production cost [1]. In particular, amorphous InGaZnO enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD). The a-IGZO channel
(a-IGZO) TFTs have been risen due to high mobility and a reason- was deposited by sputtering using a polycrystalline In2Ga2ZnO7
able on/off ratio [1,2]. Due to its high performance believed to target with thickness of 40 nm. Finally, the source and drain elec-
replace amorphous silicon (a-Si) TFTs, a-IGZO properties have been trodes were deposited by Mo with 200-nm thickness via sputtering
studied by a lot of researchers [1,2,5]. However, most of the previ- and patterned via photolithography and wet etching. For electri-
ously reported TFTs have rather large channel widths (W) and cal characterization, 4-types of TFTs with the same W/L ratio
lengths (L) because the shadow mask or lift-off techniques were (W/L ¼ 20) but different channel lengths (L ¼ 20, 10, 5, and 2.5 mm)
mainly used to pattern the gate electrode, channel, and source/ were used. To extract contact resistance, various channel lengths
drain electrodes [1,5]. For applications on high-resolution displays, with same channel width TFTs were additionally used because the
the size of TFTs should be shrunk [2]. Investigation of the scaling extraction method is length-dependable. Each type of TFTs had four
behavior of ZnO TFTs was previously reported but only short- samples for reliability comparison. Electrical characteristics of TFTs
channel effects without the contact resistance variation were were measured using a Keithley 236 source measure unit.
considered [6]. In this paper, a-IGZO TFTs with the same channel
W/L ratio (W/L ¼ 20) but different channel lengths of 20e2.5 mm
are used to examine the scaling-down behaviors of the TFTs. The 3. Results and discussion

3.1. Short-channel effects

* Corresponding author. Tel.: þ82 2 2123 4619; fax: þ82 2 313 2879. To investigate TFT characteristics, field-effect mobility (mFE),
E-mail address: [email protected] (I. Yun). threshold voltage (Vth), subthreshold gate swing (SSUB), and on/off

1567-1739/$ e see front matter Ó 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.cap.2011.01.017
1016 E.N. Cho et al. / Current Applied Physics 11 (2011) 1015e1019

current ratio (Ion/off) are examined. The mFE induced by the trans-
conductance (Gm) is determined by

Gm
mFE ¼ W

(1)
L Ci VDS

where Ci and VDS are gate capacitance per unit area and drain
voltage, respectively.
Vth is determined by adjusting gate voltage (VGS), which induces
a drain current (IDS) of L/W  10 nA at a VDS of 5.1 V [2,5]. From the
transfer characteristics (IDS vs.VGS), SSUB can be extracted using the
equation:

dVGS
SSUB ¼ (2)
dlogðIDSsub Þ
where IDSsub is the drain current in the subthreshold region.
Fig. 1(a) shows representative transfer characteristics of a-IGZO
TFT with W/L ¼ 400/20 in micron at VDS of 5.1 V and 10.1 V. Here,
the VGS is swept from 5 V to 15 V. The calculated values of
maximum mFE, Vth, and SSUB at the VDS ¼ 5.1 V are 7.64 cm2 V1 s1,
0.18 V, and 0.19 V/decade, respectively. Ion/off is up to w107. Fig. 1(b)
shows the corresponding output characteristics (IDS vs. VDS) with
various VGS. It is shown that the device can be well operated in
n-type enhancement mode.

Fig. 2. Output characteristics of a-IGZO TFTs with W/L ¼ 400/20, 200/10, 100/5, and
50/2.5 mm at (a) VGS ¼ 5 V and (b) VGS ¼ 10 V.

Fig. 1. (a) Transfer characteristics and (b) output characteristics of a-IGZO TFT with W/ Fig. 3. Transfer characteristics of a-IGZO TFTs with W/L ¼ 400/20, 200/10, 100/5, and
L ¼ 400/20 mm. 50/2.5 mm at VDS ¼ 5.1 V.
 E.N. Cho et al. / Current Applied Physics 11 (2011) 1015e1019 1017

To clearly investigate short-channel behavior effects, output VGS ¼ 5 V and VDS ¼ 10 V are selected where the devices operate
characteristics (at VGS ¼ 5 V, 10 V) and transfer characteristics (at in saturation regime as shown in Fig. 1(b). Ideally, the slope of IDS/W
VDS ¼ 5.1 V) of same W/L ratio a-IGZO TFTs with different channel as a function of 1/L should be same from Eq. (3). Fig. 5 shows the
lengths (L ¼ 20, 10, 5, and 2.5 mm) are measured and shown in graph of IDS/W vs. 1/L. The dotted line represents the linear fitting
Fig. 2 and Fig. 3, respectively. Fig. 2(a) and Fig. 2(b) show the between different 1/L values. Regardless of the channel length, the
output characteristics at VGS ¼ 5 V and 10 V, respectively. It is seen slope of IDS/W well fits to 1/L down to the channel length of 5 mm.
in Fig. 2(a) and Fig. 2(b) that the drain current exhibited increased However, when channel length goes to 2.5 mm, IDS/W shows smaller
slope near saturation region as the channel length is reduced, value than expected from Eq. (3) which means the equation is not
which is also commonly shown in a-Si TFTs [7]. The linear fitting appropriate for short-channel devices. The decrease of IDS indicates
slopes at VGS ¼ 5 V for L ¼ 20, 10, 5, and 2.5 mm are 1.5  104, mobility reduction. In order to examine the mechanism of mobility
3  104, 3.9  104, and 4.9  104 mA/V, respectively, and the reduction, the contact resistance is extracted for analysis.
slopes at VGS ¼ 10 V for L ¼ 20, 10, 5, and 2.5 mm are 2.2  103,
4.5  103, 5.6  103, and 6.3  103 mA/V, respectively. In
3.2. Contact resistance
addition, it is shown that the drain current gradually decreases
with reduced L even in the same W/L ratio indicating that the
Extraction of contact resistance (RSD) in short-channel devices is
effects of contact resistance cannot be ignored in short-channel
important due to non-ideal ohmic contact in the device [10]. This
devices. The detailed explanations about the effects of contact
contact resistance can be neglected in long-channel devices, but the
resistance will be shown in Section 3.2. In Fig. 3, it is noted that
influence of contact resistance can be more serious in short-
even the shortest channel length device can be switched off by
channel devices and cause reduction of IDS.
changing VGS. However, there is an apparent shift of Vth and
In order to examine the effect of contact resistance on the short-
a degradation of SSUB as channel length decreases. Fig. 4 shows the
channel device, conventional method of extracting total resistance
change of Vth and SSUB as channel length varies, respectively. There
(RT) and contact resistance are used [11,12]. RT is determined by:
are no apparent differences of Vth and SSUB at the channel lengths
of 20, and 10 mm, however, as the device channel length reduces to 1
5 mm, short-channel effects are shown. The shifting of Vth with RT ¼
¼ rch L þ RSD (4)
W
L mFE Ci ðVGS  Vth Þ
short-channel devices are similar of those observed in traditional
metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors (MOSFETs) where rch is the channel resistance per channel length unit and RSD
[8,9]. The portion of charges below the gate, which is directly is the total contact resistance of source/drain.
controlled by gate, reduces resulting in a lowering of the Vth which The calculated RT is plotted as a function of various channel
is called charge-sharing effect [8,9]. The degradation of SSUB with lengths for different VGS, and then linear fitting of the data is per-
reduced channel length in traditional MOSFETs can be explained formed. From Eq. (4), RSD is extracted from y-intercept of the linear
by the drain-induced barrier lowering (DIBL), in which the fit to the RT. Fig. 6(a)e(d) shows the illustration of extracting RT and
potential distribution results in an effective lowering of the barrier RSD when channel widths are 400, 200, 100, and 50 mm, respec-
for current conduction between the source and the channel [9]. In tively. It is shown that as the VGS increases, RT decreases due to the
a-IGZO TFTs, the degradation of SSUB with reduced channel length increase of channel carrier density which indicates that TFTs are in
can be explained by the increasing effects of contact resistance as ON-mode. Each RSD and RT for the TFTs with same W/L (W/L ¼ 20) is
channel length decreases (see Section 3.2). extracted from these plots.
To investigate the effects of device scaling on a-IGZO TFTs, drain In Fig. 7(a), proportion of RSD to RT (RSD/RT) is shown to further
current with the same W/L (W/L ¼ 20), but different channel investigate the effect of RSD on the TFT characteristics. RSD/RT at
lengths (L ¼ 20, 10, 5, 2.5 mm) are fitted by traditional saturation VGS ¼ 10 V increases from w20 to w65%, when channel length
drain current equation of field-effect transistors (FETs), decreases from 20 mm to 2.5 mm. The RSD/RT value rapidly increases

1 W
IDS ¼ mC ðV  Vth Þ2 (3)
2 i L GS

Fig. 4. The SSUB and Vth of a-IGZO TFTs with W/L ¼ 400/20, 200/10, 100/5, and 50/ Fig. 5. The scaling of IDS/W as a function of 1/L for a-IGZO TFTs with the same W/L at
2.5 mm at VDS ¼ 5.1 V. VGS ¼ 5 V and VDS ¼ 10 V.
1018 E.N. Cho et al. / Current Applied Physics 11 (2011) 1015e1019

Fig. 6. The RT as a function of channel length at different VGS where channel widths are (a) 400 mm, (b) 200 mm, (c) 100 mm, and (d) 50 mm.

when channel length is 2.5 mm. As shown in Fig. 7(a), RSD/RT at shrinks from 20 mm to 2.5 mm, respectively. Thus, the mobility
various VGS almost shows similar tendencies. Due to the increasing reduction can be one of the reasons of decreasing IDS at channel
portion of RSD as the channel length decreases, the externally length of 2.5 mm as shown in Fig. 5.
applied voltage is more divided into contact regions than channel The degradation of SSUB as channel length decreases should be
making the mobility reduction [2,10]. In general, mobility with also clarified. IDSsub in Eq. (2) has a following relationship [13]:
considering RSD is expressed as [2,13]:  
W Ci VGS
IDSsub fm exp (7)
L L qNT dS kB T
mFE zm0 (5)
L þ m0 WCi RSD ðVGS  Vth Þ
where q, NT, dS, kB, and T are the electron charge, the defect density
where, m0 is the mobility of the a-IGZO material. After dividing L in of a-IGZO, the channel layer thickness, the Boltzmann constant, and
both the denominator and numerator terms of Eq. (5), it can be the absolute temperature, respectively. By using Eqs. (2), (6), and
rewritten as : (7), the relationship of SSUB excluding RSD and including the
effects of RSD can be derived as [13]:
1
mFE zm0 (6)
1 þ m0 W L þ W m0 Ci RSD ðVGS  Vth Þ
L i SD ðVGS  Vth Þ
C R SSUB ¼ SSUB0 (8)
L þ W m0 RSD ½Ci ðVGS  Vth Þ  qNT dS kB T
It is assumed that m0 and the W/L ratio are the same for all tested
devices. So, only RSD and Vth terms in Eq. (6) should be considered. where SSUB0 is the subthreshold gate swing which is not affected by
From Eq. (6), if RSD is increased or Vth is decreased, mFE is decreased. the influence of the contact resistance. The equation can be
It is already shown that Vth is negatively shifted as the channel rewritten using the relationship in Eq. (6) as:
length decreases. For the RSD term, RSD is extracted with respect to
1
the channel length. For example, RSD increased from 4.5 kU to SSUB ¼ SSUB0
(9)
17.1 kU as the channel length decreased from 20 mm to 2.5 mm at 1  mFE W
L RSD qNT dS kB T
VGS ¼ 10 V. By the increasing effects of RSD and negatively shifted
Vth as the channel length decreases, the extracted mFE is decreased. It is assumed that NT, dS and the W/L ratio are the same for all
In Fig. 7(b), mFE with the different channel lengths are investigated tested devices. It is seen from Eq. (9), if RSD increases, SSUB will
and the results are shown. The maximum mFE of the TFTs decreases degrade. And in the Fig. 7(b), it is shown that mFE is almost same for
from w7 cm2 V1 s1 to w4 cm2 V1 s1 as the channel length all devices in the subthreshold regime (at low VGS). So, SSUB
 E.N. Cho et al. / Current Applied Physics 11 (2011) 1015e1019 1019

4. Conclusion

In this paper, a-IGZO TFTs with channel lengths of 2.5e20 mm

with the same W/L ratio were used to investigate the short-channel
effects. Short-channel effects observed in traditional MOSFETs have
also been shown in short-channel a-IGZO TFTs, similarly. However,
based on the result obtained from this work, the traditional drain
current equation of FETs was no longer suitable when channel
length of the TFT is reduced below 5 mm. The magnitude of drain
current was shown to be decreased in the short-channel TFTs even
in the same W/L which implied the decrease of mFE. The reduction of
mFE as the channel length decreases was also believed to be the
effect of contact resistance. To examine the effect of contact resis-
tance, total resistance and contact resistance were extracted from
the conventional method. The proportion of contact resistance to
total resistance rapidly increased with a channel length of 2.5 mm.
Therefore, the precise control of the contact resistance is important
to short-channel TFTs for high-resolution display device
fabrication.

Acknowledgments

This work was supported as a research project of Samsung

Electronics.

References

[1] K. Nomura, H. Ohta, A. Takagi, T. Kamiya, M. Hirano, H. Hosono, Nature 432

(2004) 488.
[2] M.K. Kim, J.H. Jeong, H.J. Lee, T.K. Ahn, H.S. Shin, J.S. Park, J.K. Jeong, Y.G. Mo,
H.D. Kim, Appl. Phys. Lett. 90 (2007) 212114.
[3] R.L. Hoffman, B.H. Norris, J.F. Wager, Appl. Phys. Lett. 82 (2003) 733.
[4] E. Fortunato, P. Barquinha, A. Pimentel, A. Goncalves, A. Marques, L. Pereira,
R. Martins, Adv. Mater. 17 (2005) 590.
[5] J.K. Jeong, J.H. Jeong, H.W. Yang, J.S. Park, Y.G. Mo, H.D. Kim, Appl. Phys. Lett.
91 (2007) 113505.
[6] H.H. Hsieh, C.C. Wu, Appl. Phys. Lett. 89 (2006) 041109.
[7] C.R. Wie, IEEE Trans. Electron Dev. 57 (2010) 846.
[8] Y. Taur, G.J. Hu, R.H. Dennard, L.M. Terman, C.Y. Ting, K.E. Petrillo, IEEE J. Solid-
State Circuits sc-20 (1985) 123.
[9] Y. Taur, T.H. Ning, Fundamentals of Modern VLSI Devices. Cambridge
Fig. 7. The extraction of (a) RSD/RT and (b) mFE for a-IGZO TFTs with the same W/L at University Press, Cambridge, 1998.
VDS ¼ 5.1 V. [10] J.S. Lee, S. Chang, H. Bouzid, S.-M. Koo, S.Y. Lee, Phys. Status Solidi 207 (2010)
1694.
[11] C.R. Kagan, P. Andry, Thin-film Transistors. Marcel Dekker Inc., New York,
degrades as channel length decreases due to the increasing effects 2003.
[12] P. Barquinha, A.M. Vilà, G. Goncalves, L. Pereira, R. Martins, J.R. Morante,
of contact resistance. Similar results are reported that SSUB is E. Fortunato, IEEE Trans. Electron Dev. 55 (2008) 954.
affected by RSD which is important in short-channel devices [10,13]. [13] K.-Y. Chan, E. Bunte, H. Stiebig, D. Knipp, Appl. Phys. Lett. 89 (2006) 203509.