IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTRON DEVICES, VOL. 60, NO.

2, FEBRUARY 2013 613

Physical Models for SiC and Their Application to
Device Simulations of SiC Insulated-Gate
Bipolar Transistors
Tetsuo Hatakeyama, Kenji Fukuda, and Hajime Okumura
(Invited Paper)
AbstractImportant physical models for 4H silicon carbide
(4H-SiC) are constructed based on the literature and experiments
on the physical properties of 4H-SiC. The obtained physical mod-
els are implemented into a commercial device simulator, which is
used for examining the potential performance of SiC insulated-
gate bipolar transistors (IGBTs). Device simulation using these
new physical models shows that the forward characteristics of the
conventional type of planar SiC IGBTs are signicantly poorer
than those of SiC p-i-n diodes, even if the carrier lifetime is
improved. It is shown that the degradation in the characteristics
of the conventional SiC IGBT is caused by the limited conduction
modulation at the cathode side of the n-base layer. We show that
this problem can be resolved by applying device structures that
induce a hole-barrier effect in the SiC IGBTs.
Index TermsDiodes, insulated gate bipolar transistors,
MOSFET, wide band gap semiconductors, power semiconductor
devices, semiconductor device modeling, 4H-SiC.
I. INTRODUCTION
S
ILICON carbide presents a great promise in the eld of
high-power devices. Among many SiC power devices,
SiC insulated-gate bipolar transistors (IGBTs) are regarded as
promising candidates for ultrahigh-voltage (> 5 kV) electrical
power switches, owing to their good ON-state characteristics
because of conductivity modulation. However, as of now, the
low carrier lifetime of SiC has hampered the potential per-
formance of SiC IGBTs. In the recent years, several groups
have succeeded in improving the carrier lifetime by reducing
the density of deep levels denoted by Z
1/2
[1], [2]. In the
near future, carrier lifetime will not be a limiting factor for the
performance of SiC IGBTs. Accordingly, the device design of
SiC IGBTs will become increasingly important. In this paper,
the potential performance of SiC on IGBTs is examined using
Manuscript received July 24, 2012; revised September 14, 2012; accepted
September 27, 2012. Date of publication November 30, 2012; date of current
version January 18, 2013. This work was supported by a grant from the Japan
Society for the Promotion of Science through the Funding Program for World-
Leading Innovative R&D on Science and Technology program, initiated by
the Council for Science and Technology Policy. The review of this paper was
arranged by Editor M. Miura-Mattausch.
The authors are with the Advanced Power Electronics Research Center,
National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, Tsukuba
305-8561 Japan (e-mail: tetsuo-hatakeyama@aist.go.jp; k-fukuda@aist.go.jp;
h-okumura@aist.go.jp).
Digital Object Identier 10.1109/TED.2012.2226590
device simulations. Before addressing this issue, the physical
models for 4H silicon carbide (4H-SiC) are constructed based
on the literature and on experiments investigating the physical
properties of 4H-SiC, because physical modeling is important
for obtaining reliable and quantitative information about de-
vices through the use of simulations.
II. PHYSICAL MODELS FOR 4H-SiC
In this paper, we focus on the 4H polytype of SiC, because
4H-SiC is the best suited material for power devices among
the many polytypes of SiC owing to its superior material
properties. For example, it has a large bandgap, which indicates
a high breakdown eld or large breakdown voltage; a high bulk
mobility, which results in low ON-state resistance; and little
anisotropy in physical properties, which reduces the efforts
of designing device structure. Further, 4H-SiC has a mature
material technology. We note that high-quality large-diameter
(up to 150 mm) 4H-SiC wafers, which are an indispensable
prerequisite for the production of power devices, have been
commercialized.
A. Dielectric Constant
As far as we know, the dielectric constant for 4H-SiC has not
been reported. We use the values for 6H-SiCreported by Patrick
and Choyke [3]

= 9.66

= 10.03 (1)
for directions orthogonal () and parallel () to the hexagonal
c-axis.
B. Band Structure
1) Bandgap Model: The bandgap for 4H-SiC is expressed
by the sum of the exitonic bandgap E
gx
(T) and the binding
energy for an exiton E
x
as follows:
E
g
(T) = E
gx
(T) +E
x
. (2)
The temperature dependence of the exitonic bandgap E
gx
(T)
for 4H-SiC has been measured by Choyke [4]. Therefore,
according to (2), the temperature dependence of the bandgap
is derived from the exitonic binding energy (E
x
= 20 meV),
0018-9383/$31.00 2012 IEEE
614 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTRON DEVICES, VOL. 60, NO. 2, FEBRUARY 2013
Fig. 1. Comparison of the measured temperature dependence of the bandgap
for 4H-SiC [4], [5] and the result of tting.
which is obtained by Dubrovskii and Sankin based on the
measurements of the change in power-law energy dependence
of the absorption coefcient for 4H-SiC at 4.2 K [5]. We note
that the measured values are SE
g
= 3.285 eV at 4.2 K and
E
g
= 3.25 eV at 300 K. The temperature dependence of the
bandgap for 4H-SiCis tted as follows with Varshnis empirical
expression [6]:
E
g
(T) = 3.285 9.06 10
4

T
2
T + 2.03 10
3
(eV). (3)
Fig. 1 shows the measured temperature dependence of the
bandgap of 4H-SiC [4], [5] as determined by the tting results.
2) Effective Masses: In this subsection, we discuss the den-
sity of state (DOS) masses of electrons and holes. If we neglect
the temperature dependence of the mass of electrons, the effec-
tive conduction-band DOS (N
c
) is expressed by
N
c
= 2n
v
_
2m
d
e
k
B
T/h
2
_
(3/2)
(4)
where n
v
and m
d
e
are the degeneracy of the minimum of
the conduction band (valleys) and the effective DOS mass of
electrons, respectively. 4H-SiC has effectively three valleys at
M points of the Brillouin zone [7]. Therefore
n
v
= 3. (5)
The effective DOS mass of electrons is given by the geometric
mean around the minimum point as [7]
m
d
e
m
0
=
3

m
M
m
MK
m
ML
= 0.394 (6)
where m
0
is the mass of a free electron. For the denitions of
the other mass parameters, see [7].
Next, we account for the deviation from the effective mass
approximation of the temperature dependence of the effective
Fig. 2. Temperature dependence of electron thermal DOS effective mass for
4H-SiC and results obtained by tting.
DOS by introducing thermal DOS effective masses. The elec-
tron thermal DOS effective mass is dened as [7]
n(T) =

_
E
g
n
v
m
d
e
(T)
3/2

2Ef(E, T)dE. (7)

The electron thermal DOS effective mass was calculated by
Wellenhofer and Rssler from rst principles by using (7) [7].
Their results are tted as follows:
m
d
e
(T)
m
0
= 0.394 + 3.09 10
8
T
2
+ 2.23 10
10
T
3
1.65 10
13
T
4
. (8)
We note that m
d
e
(300)/m
0
0.40. Fig. 2 shows the tem-
perature dependence of the thermal DOS effective mass for
electrons in 4H-SiC based on the results obtained by tting.
In the same manner, the calculated hole thermal DOS ef-
fective mass [7] is tted using a polynomial expression [8] as
follows:
m
d
h
(T)
m
0
=
_
1+6.92 10
2
T + 1.88 10
6
T
4
1+6.58 10
4
T
2
+4.32 10
7
T
4
_
2/3
. (9)
Fig. 3 shows the temperature dependence of the hole thermal
DOS effective mass based on the results obtained by tting.
We note that m
d
h
(300)/m
0
2.64. Further, we also point out
that the hole thermal DOS effective mass for 4H-SiC is almost
independent of temperature above room temperature.
3) Intrinsic Carrier Density: The intrinsic carrier density
n
i
(T) is obtained using the following equation:
n
i
(T) =
_
N
c
(T)N
v
(T) exp
_

E
g
(T)
kT
_
(10)
where N
c
(T) and N
v
(T) are the effective conduction-band
DOS and the effective valence-band DOS, respectively. Fig. 4
HATAKEYAMA et al.: MODELS AND THEIR APPLICATION TO SIMULATIONS OF SiC IGBTs 615
Fig. 3. Temperature dependence of the hole thermal DOS effective mass for
4H-SiC and the result of tting.
Fig. 4. Temperature dependence of intrinsic carrier concentration for 4H-SiC,
6H-SiC, 3C-SiC, diamond, and silicon [9].
shows the temperature dependence of the intrinsic carrier con-
centration for 4H-SiC and other semiconductors [9].
C. Low-Field-Mobility Model
Anisotropy of the low-eld bulk mobility for electrons and
holes can be expressed as [10], [11]

e,
= 1.2
e,

h,
= 0.87
h,
(11)
where
e,(h),
and
e,(h),
are electron (hole) mobilities par-
allel and perpendicular to the c-axis, respectively. It should be
noted that the anisotropy of mobility is caused by the anisotropy
of effective masses.
Hereafter, we consider the bulk mobility perpendicular to the
c-axis without loss of generality. We adopt the Arora model for
Fig. 5. Doping density dependence of bulk mobility for 4H-SiC along with
that of the previous work [14] and the experimental results [13].
the doping-dependent low-eld bulk mobility
b
(N
dop
)

b
(N
dop
) =
min
+

d

min
1 + (N
dop
/N
ref
)
A

(12)
with

min
=A
min
(T/300)

m
(13)

d
=A
d
(T/300)

d
(14)
N
ref
=A
N
(T/300)

N
(15)
A

=A
a
(T/300)

a
(16)
N
dop
=N
D
+N
A
(17)
where N
dop
, N
D
, and N
A
are the total doping concentration,
donor concentration, and acceptor concentration, respectively.
It should be noted that
b
is not a function of ionized impurity
concentration but of total doping concentration. As discussed
by Koizumi et al., the low-eld hole mobility is a function of
total doping concentration because hole mobility in a heavily
doped sample is also limited by neutral impurity scattering as
well as ionized impurity scattering [12]. We also note that, in
many cases, a commercial device simulator treats low-eld mo-
bility as a function of the total doping concentration by default.
The parameters for electron mobility are extracted by using
the published experimental results reported by Matsunami and
Kimoto [13], wherein the doping densities are estimated from
the carrier density. The results of the tting obtained in this
work are shown in Fig. 5, along with those obtained in the
previous work [14], in addition to the experimental results [13].
For hole mobility, the parameters extracted by Koizumi et al.
[12] are adopted. The parameters for the low-eld-mobility
model are summarized in Table I.
D. Incomplete Ionization
The most common n-type dopant for SiC is nitrogen. Nitro-
gen atoms substitute for carbon atoms on the lattice sites in
4H-SiC. There are two types of carbon sites in SiC: One is
616 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTRON DEVICES, VOL. 60, NO. 2, FEBRUARY 2013
TABLE I
PARAMETERS FOR DOPING-DEPENDENT MOBILITY MODEL
TABLE II
PARAMETERS FOR INCOMPLETE IONIZATION
surrounded by four silicon atoms with hexagonal symmetry (h),
and the other is surrounded by those with cubic symmetry (k).
As a result, there are two ionization energies (E
h
and E
k
)
in nitrogen-doped SiC [15]. Given these two ionization ener-
gies, the ionized donor density N
+
D
is given by the following
equation:
N
+
D
=
0.5N
D
1+g
D
n
N
c
exp
_
E
h
k
B
T
_+
0.5N
D
1+g
D
n
N
c
exp
_
E
k
k
B
T
_ (18)
where g
D
= 2 is a degeneracy factor. If we can neglect the
dynamic effects accompanying incomplete ionization, these
two donor levels can be replaced by a single effective level
E
D
, as proposed by Bakowski et al. [16]
N
+
D
=
N
D
1 +g
D
n
N
c
exp
_
E
D
k
B
T
_. (19)
It should be noted that the ionization energy (E) is effectively
reduced when the total doping density (N
dop
) is increased as
follows:
E = E
0
N
1/3
dop
(20)
where E
0
and are the ionization energy at the low doping
density limit and a tting parameter, respectively. The param-
eters of the single-energy-level model were obtained by tting
the activation ratio as a function of the doping density based
on the two-energy-level model [14]. For acceptors, parameters
extracted by Koizumi et al. [12] are used in this paper. It should
be noted that the degeneracy factor for holes g
A
is four. The
parameters for the incomplete ionization model are summarized
in Table II. Fig. 6 shows the activation ratio as a function of
doping density for donors and acceptors. For donors, results
calculated using the two-level model and the single-energy
model are shown for comparison.
E. Impact Ionization
Impact ionization coefcients are important material proper-
ties for power devices, because the avalanche breakdown of a
power device is caused by the impact ionization phenomenon.
Fig. 6. Activation ratio as a function of doping density for donors and
acceptors. For donors, results calculated using the two-energy-level model and
the single-energy-level model are shown for comparison.
Accordingly, a physical model of the impact ionization co-
efcient is indispensable for predicting the electrical charac-
teristics of power devices. Further, owing to the hexagonal
crystal structure of 4H-SiC, carrier transport in 4H-SiC exhibits
anisotropy, which results in an anisotropy in impact ionization.
In this subsection, we briey describe an anisotropic impact
ionization model for 4H-SiC.
We assumed the following functional form as the model
of the impact ionization coefcients suggested by Chynoweth
[17], Capasso [18], and Crowell and Sze [19]:
=a
e
exp
_

b
e

F
_
(21)
=a
h
exp
_

b
h

F
_
(22)
with
=
tanh
_

op
2k
B
T
0
_
tanh
_

op
2k
B
T
_ (23)
where
op
and F represent the optical phonon energy and
the magnitude of the electric eld, respectively. The other
parameters (a
e
, b
e
, a
h
, and b
h
) are tting parameters. Experi-
ments performed using p
+
-n diodes showed that the anisotropy
of impact ionization coefcients in 4H-SiC leads to 81%
anisotropy in breakdown elds [20][22]. This anisotropy in
the impact ionization coefcient is expressed by two sets of
parameters corresponding to the main axes (c- and a-axes)
parallel to the applied electric eld. The parameters of the
electron and hole impact ionization coefcients are summarized
in Table III [21], [22].
We nowpresent an analytical model of the anisotropic impact
ionization coefcients, which interpolates impact ionization co-
efcients parallel and perpendicular to the c-axis [23]. First, it is
HATAKEYAMA et al.: MODELS AND THEIR APPLICATION TO SIMULATIONS OF SiC IGBTs 617
TABLE III
PARAMETERS OF IMPACT IONIZATION COEFFICIENTS
OF HOLES AND ELECTRONS IN 4H-SiC
assumed that the anisotropy of the impact ionization coefcient
in 4H-SiC has cylindrical symmetry with regard to the c-axis.
This assumption is plausible because experiments showed that
the anisotropy of the bulk mobility in 4H-SiC has cylindrical
symmetry [10] and that the anisotropy of impact ionization
coefcients is closely related to that of mobility [22]. Based
on this assumption, the impact ionization coefcients perpen-
dicular to the c-axis are replaced by those parallel to the a-axis.
Hereafter, we only discuss the impact ionization coefcient of
electrons at room temperature without loss of generality. The
impact ionization coefcients parallel and perpendicular to the
c-axis are dened as follows:
(F) =a

exp(b

/F) for F c-axis (24)

(F) =a

exp(b

/F) for F c-axis (25)

where a

, b

, a

, and b

are experimentally determined param-

eters of the anisotropic impact ionization. F denotes the norm
of the electric eld F. The electric eld F is decomposed into
a parallel part F

and a perpendicular part F

as follows:
F = (F

, F

). (26)
Hence, F is dened as
F |F|
_
F
2

+F
2

. (27)
The interpolation formula for the impact ionization coefcients
is derived by considering the energy balance equation [22],
[23]. The analytic expression for the anisotropic impact ion-
ization coefcients in any direction of the electric eld is
(F) = a exp

b
F

1 A
2
_
bF

Fb

_
2

(28)
where b, a, and A are dened by the following equations:
F
2
b
2
=
F
2

b
2

+
F
2

b
2

(29)
a =a
(
b
2
F
2

)
(
b
2

F
2
)

a
_
b
2
F
2

_
_
b
2

F
2
_

(30)
A = ln
_
a

_
. (31)
It should be noted that this anisotropic impact ionization model
has been implemented in some commercial device simulators.
TABLE IV
PARAMETERS FOR THE HIGH-FIELD-MOBILITY MODEL IN 4H-SiC
F. High-Field Mobility
The saturation of carrier velocity under a high electric eld is
caused by the increase in elastic and nonelastic scattering owing
to the increase in carrier energy. Khan and Cooper measured
the electric eld dependence of electron drift velocity perpen-
dicular to the c-axis in 4H-SiC at room temperature and at
600 K [24]. The saturation phenomenon is modeled by Lades
[25] using the Canali model [26] as follows:

high

=

low

_
1 +
_

low

F
v
sat

_1

(32)
with
v
sat

=v
sat
0,

_
T
300
_

(33)
=
0

_
T
300
_

(34)
where
high

,
low

, and v
sat

are the high-eld mobility, low-

eld mobility, and saturation velocity, respectively. The other
parameters are tting parameters. The sufx is added to
designate these physical parameters as those perpendicular to
the c-axis. The tted parameters for the high-eld-mobility
model are summarized in Table IV [24], [25].
To simulate the IV characteristics of SiC power devices,
the high-eld mobility parallel to the c-axis is more important
than that perpendicular to the c-axis, because current ows
vertically through the epitaxial layer on a (0001) wafer in SiC
power devices. Unfortunately, to the best of the authors knowl-
edge, measurements of electron saturation velocity parallel
to the c-axis have not been reported. However, the anisotropy of
the saturation velocity can be estimated from the anisotropy of
the impact ionization coefcients [22]. The electron saturation
velocity parallel to the c-axis is estimated to be about 60% of
that perpendicular to the c-axis. Further, the hole saturation
velocity parallel to the c-axis is estimated to be about 80%
of that perpendicular to the c-axis. Monte Carlo studies of
high-eld transport in 4H-SiC have shown similar results of
the anisotropy of the carrier velocity [27][29]. Further, to the
authors knowledge, no measurements have been reported for
the hole saturation velocity perpendicular to the c-axis. The
calculated hole saturation velocity in Monte Carlo studies is
around 1 10
7
cm/s [28], [29].
G. Carrier Lifetime
For determining the SRH lifetimes
n
and
p
for electrons
and holes, we assumed the following doping-dependent model
which is commonly used for silicon:

n,p
=

n0,p0
1 +
_
N
dop
N
SRH
ref
_

(35)
618 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTRON DEVICES, VOL. 60, NO. 2, FEBRUARY 2013
Fig. 7. Forward characteristics of an n-type planar IGBT with different carrier
lifetimes.
where N
SRH
ref
=310
17
cm
3
and =0.3 [9]. In general, SRH
lifetimes depend on the growth condition of epitaxial layers
and the process conditions of device fabrication [1], [2], [30].
Therefore,
n0
and
p0
are treated as parameters in device
simulations.
III. SIMULATION OF SiC IGBTs
In this section, we describe the potential performance of SiC
IGBTs examined using device simulations. By using a device
simulation technique, Cooper et al. obtained the ideal charac-
teristics of SiC IGBTs [31]. However, they did not explicitly
examine the device structure that induces the hole-barrier effect,
which is the key to reducing ON-state resistance of IGBTs. In
this paper, we focus on device structures that induce the hole-
barrier effect and improve the forward characteristics of SiC
IGBTs. It has been claimed that the low carrier lifetime of SiC
has hampered the potential performance of SiC IGBTs. In view
of this claim, rst, we examine the impact of the lifetime on
the forward characteristics of planar IGBTs. Fig. 7 shows the
calculated forward characteristics of an n-type planar IGBT
with different carrier lifetimes. Forward characteristics of a SiC
p-i-n diode (
max
= 10 s) are also shown for comparison. In
addition, the schematic of the device structure of the IGBT
(punchthrough type) is shown in Fig. 7. The thickness of the
n-base layer is 100 m, and the doping density is 7
10
14
cm
3
. The estimated breakdown voltage of this device
is more than 13 kV. It should be noted that the effect of the
resistance of a p-type substrate on the forward characteristics
is neglected in the simulation by assuming that thin p-type
layers are grown on the reverse side of the wafer. In Fig. 7, the
forward characteristics of the planar IGBT are improved as the
lifetime is improved. However, the forward characteristics of
the IGBT are signicantly poorer than those of the p-i-n diode.
Accordingly, it is concluded that low carrier lifetime as well as
device design has hampered the potential performance of SiC
IGBTs. The analysis performed using the carrier distribution
Fig. 8. Forward characteristics of HiGTs and a conventional planar IGBT.
under conduction shows that the low performance of a SiC
IGBT under high carrier lifetime is caused by the limited
conduction modulation at the emitter side of the n-base layer.
Enhancement of the conduction modulation in the drift layer of
the SiC IGBT is required to fully utilize the high carrier lifetime
and superior material properties of SiC.
As discussed as follows, this problem is resolved by applying
the device concepts of Si IGBTs to SiC IGBTs. An n-type
hole-barrier layer surrounding a p-body of an IGBT enhances
the conduction modulation in the case of Si IGBTs [32]. We
have applied this device concept to the device design of planar
SiC IGBTs. Fig. 8 shows a comparison of the forward charac-
teristics of a SiC IGBT with a hole-barrier layer (HiGT) and
a conventional planar IGBT. In this simulation, the thickness
of the hole-barrier layer is 0.5 m, and the doping density of
the hole-barrier layer is treated as a parameter. A hole-barrier
layer signicantly improves the forward characteristics of a
SiC IGBT.
Fig. 9 shows a comparison of the hole-density distribution
prole for a conventional IGBT and HiGTs with different
doping densities of the hole-barrier layer. It can be seen that
a hole-barrier layer hinders the ow of holes into the p-body,
which results in an increase in carrier density at the emitter
side of the drift layer. It should be noted that inserting a hole-
barrier layer on the top of the drift layer degrades the avalanche
breakdown voltage, because the hole-barrier layer effectively
increases the doping density of the drift layer.
Another important device, which enhances the conduction
modulation, is an IEGT [33]. An IEGT is a trench gate IGBT,
whose trench gate is designed to hinder the ow of holes into
the p-body. It should be noted that the electrical eld crowding
at the deep trench corner in a SiC IEGT is a central issue in its
fabrication. However, this crowding may be avoided by using
device structures for relaxing the electrical elds, such as a
dummy deep trench with a thick gate oxide. For this reason,
we neglect the crowding effect. Fig. 10 shows the forward char-
acteristics of SiC IEGTs with different geometry parameters
HATAKEYAMA et al.: MODELS AND THEIR APPLICATION TO SIMULATIONS OF SiC IGBTs 619
Fig. 9. Comparison of hole-density distribution prole along the vertical cut
at a current density of 200 A/cm
2
.
Fig. 10. Forward characteristics of IEGTs. Those of a p-i-n diode are shown
for comparison.
for the trench gate. The forward characteristics of a SiC p-i-n
diode are also shown for comparison. Upon reducing the source
width and increasing the gate depth, the forward characteristics
of an IEGT are found to approach those of a p-i-n diode. Fig. 11
shows a comparison of the hole-density distribution prole for
IEGTs with different geometry parameters for the trench gate. It
can be seen that the hole density at the emitter side increases as
the gate depth (D) increases. It should be noted that an almost
at hole-density distribution over the drift layer is realized in
the case of W = 0.5 m and D = 7.5 m.
This IEGT is expected to correspond to a practical material-
limit IGBT that is characterized by a at carrier distribution
over the n-base layer in the conduction state, which was dis-
cussed by Nakagawa [34], [35]. Fig. 12 shows a comparison
of the forward characteristics of a practical SiC-limit IGBT, an
Fig. 11. Comparison of hole distribution prole along the vertical cut at a
current density of 200 A/cm
2
.
Fig. 12. Comparison of forward characteristics of a practical SiC-limit IGBT,
an IEGT, an HiGT, and a planar IGBT.
IEGT, an HiGT, and a planar IGBT. In this gure, the forward
characteristics of a practical material-limit IGBT are calculated
according to the formula discussed in [35]. It can be seen that
the forward characteristics of the IEGT (W = 0.5 m) are
almost the same as those of a practical SiC-limit IGBT. Thus, it
can be concluded that a practical SiC-limit IGBT is realized by
reducing the mesa width of a SiC IEGT by less than 0.5 m. It
should be noted that the hole-barrier mechanism of a material-
limit IGBT is different from that of an IEGT [34]. In the case of
an IEGT, the narrow mesa per se acts as a hole barrier, whereas
in the case of a material-limit IGBT, elevated electron density
in the narrow mesa, which is induced by the MOS gate, acts as
a hole barrier. Fig. 13 shows the electron density at the center
of the mesa as a function of the mesa width (W). It can be seen
that the electron density increases as the parameter W decreases
620 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTRON DEVICES, VOL. 60, NO. 2, FEBRUARY 2013
Fig. 13. Electron density at the center of the mesa as a function of mesa
width (W).
Fig. 14. Forward voltage at 200 A/cm
2
as a function of the length of the
n-channel (D).
when the parameter W is less than 0.5 m. This means that
a SiC-limit IGBT is realized when the parameter W is less
than 0.5 m. Fig. 14 shows the forward voltage at 200 A/cm
2
as a function of the gate depth (D). The dependence of the
forward voltage on the parameter D changes when the pa-
rameter W is smaller than 0.5 m. In the case of IEGTs, the
forward voltage decreases as the parameter D increases. When
the parameter W is less than 0.5 m, the forward voltage
increases as the parameter D increases. This D dependence of
the forward voltage is also a feature of SiC-limit IGBTs.
IV. SUMMARY
Physical models for 4H-SiC have been constructed according
to the literature and experiments investigating the physical
properties of 4H-SiC. The obtained physical models are imple-
mented in a commercial device simulator. We have examined
the potential performance of SiC using the device simulator. We
have shown that the device concepts of Si IGBTs are effective
for improving the performance of SiC IGBTs. We have also
shown that the SiC-limit IGBT is realized when the mesa width
is less than 0.5 m.
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Tetsuo Hatakeyama received the Ph.D. degree from
The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.
He is with the Advanced Power Electronics Re-
search Center, National Institute of Advanced Indus-
trial Science and Technology, Tsukuba, Japan.
Kenji Fukuda received the Ph.D. degree from Hokkaido University, Sapporo,
Japan.
He is with the Advanced Power Electronics Research Center, National
Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, Tsukuba, Japan.
Hajime Okumura received the Ph.D. degree from
Osaka University, Osaka, Japan, in 1990.
He is with Power Electronics Research Center,
National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science
and Technology, Tsukuba, Japan.