RESEARCH ARTICLE | MARCH 15 2021

Characteristics of Ni-based ohmic contacts on n-type 4H-SiC

using different annealing methods
Special Collection: Wide Bandgap (WBG) Semiconductors: from Fundamentals to Applications

Ziwei Zhou; Weiwei He  ; Zhenzhong Zhang; Jun Sun; Adolf Schöner; Zedong Zheng

Nanotechnology and Precision Engineering 4, 013006 (2021)

https://doi.org/10.1063/10.0003763

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 Nanotechnology and
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Characteristics of Ni-based ohmic contacts

on n-type 4H-SiC using different
annealing methods
Cite as: Nano. Prec. Eng. 4, 013006 (2021); doi: 10.1063/10.0003763
Submitted: 29 October 2020 • Accepted: 18 February 2021 •
Published Online: 15 March 2021

Ziwei Zhou,1 Weiwei He,1,a) Zhenzhong Zhang,1 Jun Sun,1 Adolf Schöner,1 and Zedong Zheng2

AFFILIATIONS
1
Research and Development Department, BASiC Semiconductor Ltd., Shenzhen 518000, China
2
Department of Electrical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China

a)
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed: hww@basicsemi.com

ABSTRACT
Nickel is an excellent ohmic-contact metal on 4H-SiC. This paper discusses the formation mechanism of nickel ohmic contact on 4H-

01 September 2023 10:57:09

SiC by assessing the electrical properties and microstructural change. Under high-temperature annealing, the phase of nickel-silicon
compound can be observed with X-ray diffraction, and the contact resistance also changes. A comparative experiment was designed
to use X-ray diffraction and energy-dispersive spectroscopy to clarify the difference of ohmic-contact material composition and ele-
mental analysis between samples prepared using pulsed laser annealing and rapid thermal annealing. It is found that more Ni2 Si and
carbon vacancies formed at the interface in the sample prepared using pulsed laser annealing, resulting in a better ohmic-contact
characteristic.
© 2021 Author(s). All article content, except where otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). https://doi.org/10.1063/10.0003763
KEYWORDS
Laser annealing, Rapid thermal annealing, Ohmic contact, Ni, 4H-SiC, Carbon vacancy

I. INTRODUCTION manufacturing, with RTA being relatively inexpensive and widely

Silicon carbide (SiC) is a wide-bandgap semiconductor mate-
rial with high thermal conductivity, high breakdown field, high-
saturation electron drift velocity, high chemical stability, strong
mechanical strength, and other excellent properties, all of which
allow the development of high-power electronics applications.1–4
Ohmic contact (OC) plays an important role in SiC power devices,
with lower OC resistance being effective in reducing device losses
and obtaining better performance.5 There are many ways to reduce
OC resistance, such as by changing the OC metal, changing the
annealing process, and adopting special surface treatment technolo-
gies.6–8 Nickel (Ni) is an excellent OC metal on 4H-SiC. Han et al.9
studied the OC formation mechanism of Ni on n-type 4H-SiC, and
herein we study the properties of Ni-based OCs under different
annealing processes.
The processes of rapid thermal annealing (RTA) and pulsed
laser annealing (PLA) have their own advantages in chip
used. Vassilevski et al.10 deposited 50-nm-thick Ni on SiC and cal-
culated a specific contact resistance (SCR) of 9 × 10−5 Ω cm2 after
2 min of annealing at 1000 ○ C. Perez et al.11 deposited 100-nm-
thick Ni and 30-nm-thick Ti layers on SiC and obtained an SCR of
3 × 10−5 Ω cm2 after 3 min of annealing at 900 ○ C. Liu et al.12 used
a 100-nm-thick Ni layer with 1 min of annealing at 975 ○ C in an N2
atmosphere and obtained an SCR of 6 × 10−5 Ω cm2 .
Most previous research involving RTA has been focused on
the OC mechanism and has involved using different contact metals
and characterizing the surface morphology. However, wafer process-
ing with RTA is somewhat complicated and involves four steps: (i)
contact metal processing on the rear side of the wafer, (ii) Schot-
tky structure formation on the front side, (iii) metal deposition on
the rear side, and (iv) passivation layer deposition and curing on
the front side. To optimize the process sequence, PLA is intro-
duced, which involves only two steps: (i) Schottky structure forma-
tion and passivation on the front side of the wafer, and (ii) contact

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formation and metal deposition on the rear side.13 Under PLA, the
rear side of the wafer can be processed after completing the front
structure, and the temperature on the rear surface can be greater
than 950 ○ C and less than 600 ○ C within 10 μm without affecting
the metal properties on the front of the wafer.14 de Silva et al.14 used
a laser density of 4.7 J/cm2 to obtain an SCR of 4 × 10−4 Ω cm2 ,
Cheng et al.15 used a laser density of 6 J/cm2 to obtained an SCR of
1.97 × 10−3 Ω cm2 , and Rascunà et al.16 studied Ni-based OCs with
laser annealing (4.7 J/cm2 ) to deal with 4H-SiC and obtained an SCR
of 5 × 10−5 Ω cm2 .
Herein, we seek to characterize the material composition and
element proportions of nickel silicide (Ni2 Si) to evaluate which
annealing method gives the best OC properties and why. To assess
the similarities and differences of Ni/4H-SiC interfaces after RTA
and PLA, we use X-ray diffraction (XRD) and energy-dispersive
spectroscopy (EDS).

II. EXPERIMENTAL WORK

N-type nitrogen-doped 4H-SiC C-face (0001) bulk substrates FIG. 1. Total resistance vs contact distance d (30–100 μm) for rapid thermal
annealing (RTA) and pulsed laser annealing (PLA) samples. Inset a: I–V curves
with a thickness of 360 μm and a doping concentration of for d = 30 μm. Inset b: schematic of transmission line model (TLM) structure.
8.0 × 1018 cm3 were used in the experiments. The samples were
cleaned with standard cleaning fluids of RCA, 1#, 2#, and buffered
oxide etchant (BOE) cleaning, then rinsed with deionized water
laterally isolated.17 The I–V characteristic curves (d = 30 μm) of
and blow-dried with N2 . An Ni layer (100 nm) was deposited on
the PLA and RTA samples are shown in Fig. 1(a), and each anneal-
the SiC and heat treated by RTA or PLA under different experi-
ing method obtained OC characteristics. The SCR Rc is calculated
mental conditions. Each RTA sample was annealed at 950 ○ C for

01 September 2023 10:57:09

2 min in N2 ambient, while each PLA sample was treated under
the following parameters: the laser wavelength was 355 nm with
a 100-μm beam diameter, the laser power was 2.8 J/cm2 , and the
scanning speed was 660 mm/s. To measure the SCR, the trans-
mission line model (TLM) structure was employed. The fabri-
cation process of the TLM structure can be divided into three
steps: (i) remove the excess Ni layer to leave only Ni2 Si; (ii) fin-
ish the OC photo-etching and deposit an oxide layer; (iii) deposit
a Ti/Ni/Ag metal layer by vacuum evaporation and metal photo-
etching. The TLM model consists of five contact pads (200 μm
× 60 μm) with spacings of d1 = 30, d2 = 40, d3 = 50, and
d4 = 100 μm.
from13
Rsh × d
Rtotal = 2Rc + , (1)
Z
where the contact width is Z = 200 μm, the contact gap d varies
from 30 to 100 μm, and Rsh is the sheet resistance. According to the
test and data fitting of Rtotal vs contact distance in Fig. 1, the PLA
sample had the better OC characteristic (OC resistance: 0.428 Ω)
than the RTA sample (OC resistance: 1.745 Ω). The SCR values
of the PLA and RTA samples were calculated as 5.1 × 10−5 and
2.1 × 10−4 Ω cm2 , respectively. As indicated, for the same wafer
processed with different annealing methods, the SCR of the PLA

III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

A. Results
Through data fitting and calculation of the TLM data for
the samples, the SCR values for the PLA and RTA samples were
5.1 × 10−5 and 2.1 × 10−4 Ω cm2 , respectively. The XRD data show
that the Ni/SiC interface in each type of sample was Ni2 Si, and the
EDS data show that the PLA sample contained more Ni2 Si because
of the higher proportions of Ni. Based on the analysis, the PLA sam-
ple had more free carbon distributed on the SiC surface, therefore
there may have been many carbon vacancies inside the SiC. Both of
these phenomena could reduce the OC resistance, which is probably
why the PLA sample had the better OC characteristic.

B. Discussion
A TLM test pattern was prepared to measure the electrical
FIG. 2. X-ray diffraction (XRD) patterns for (a) RTA and (b) PLA samples, with
properties of the Ni/SiC contacts on the PLA and RTA samples. standard patterns for (c) SiC JCPDS#29-1129 and (d) Ni2 Si JCPDS#48-1339.
As shown in Fig. 1(b), each contact pad of the TLM structure was

Nano. Prec. Eng. 4, 013006 (2021); doi: 10.1063/10.0003763 4, 013006-2

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FIG. 3. Energy-dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) results for (a) PLA and (b) RTA samples. For each spectrum, the inset shows the corresponding sampling region.
sample was lower than that of the RTA sample. In future work,
we will change the PLA parameters (e.g., laser wavelength, beam
diameter, laser power, scanning speed) to optimize the interface
temperature distribution and obtain better OC quality.
We then removed the metal layer to expose the Ni/SiC inter-
face to the surface, and the XRD patterns for the RTA and PLA
samples are shown in Figs. 2(a) and 2(b), respectively. The broad
peak around 22○ in the XRD data for the RTA and PLA samples
is because each sample was fixed to the sample table with paraffin.
The other diffraction peaks for the RTA and PLA samples belong
to SiC (JCPDS#29-1129) and Ni2 Si (JCPDS#48-1339). The presence
of some low-intensity impurity peaks in the XRD patterns for the
RTA and PLA samples might be due to other forms of nickel sili-
cide (e.g., NiSi or NiSi2 ), but it is clear that Ni2 Si is the predomi-
nant phase. Note that the diffraction peaks for the PLA sample are
much stronger in intensity than those for the RTA sample, which
means that the Ni2 Si in the PLA sample had better lattice arrange-
ment, and the PLA sample may have had more Ni2 Si in its Ni/SiC
interface.
To determine whether the PLA sample had more Ni2 Si in its
Ni/SiC interface, we consider the EDS spectra of the PLA and RTA
samples as shown in Fig. 3. The integral intensity of the Ni peak for
the PLA sample is obviously larger than that for the RTA sample,
and the elemental composition ratios (Table I) lead to the same con-
clusion: the PLA sampling region contained 25.30% Ni, whereas the
RTA one contained only 8.33% Ni, which indicates that more Ni2 Si
was generated in the PLA sample.
According to the literature, the OC characteristic is due to
the formation of Ni2 Si.18,19 During high-temperature annealing, Ni
TABLE I. Elemental composition ratios [%] in PLA and RTA sampling regions.
Samples Si C O
PLA 27.61 12.73 34.36
RTA 38.67 14.78 38.22
Nano. Prec. Eng. 4, 013006 (2021); doi: 10.1063/10.0003763
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reacts with SiC to produce Ni2 Si, and at the same time free carbon
forms and aggregates in the Ni/SiC interface, free carbon being a
highly efficient conductor of electricity.20 Therefore, more graphite
is distributed in the interface of the PLA sample, so its OC charac-
teristic is better. On the other hand, the free carbon moves to the
01 September 2023 10:57:09
SiC surface, so there might be many carbon vacancies inside the SiC
that can act as donors with positive charges, and the width of the
depletion layer and the height of the effective tunneling barrier for
electrons transport decrease simultaneously, resulting in the reduc-
tion of SCR.21,22 Based on these two phenomena, using PLA can
enhance the OC characteristic of 4H-SiC devices by lowering the
SCR.
IV. CONCLUSIONS
Prepared samples were treated with either PLA (2.8 J/cm2 ) or
RTA (950 ○ C for 2 min). The PLA sample had a better OC charac-
teristic, with an OC resistance of 5.1 × 10−5 Ω cm2 , whereas the SCR
of the RTA sample was only 2.1 × 10−4 Ω cm2 . Material composition
and element analysis using XRD and EDS showed that the Ni/SiC
interface of the PLA sample contained more Ni2 Si, indicating that
more carbon clusters and carbon vacancies were produced. Carbon
clusters help to increase the conductivity, and carbon vacancies help
to increase the tunneling probability. Therefore, using PLA instead
of RTA results in 4H-SiC devices with a better OC characteristic with
lower SCR.
DECLARATION OF COMPETING INTERESTS
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to
influence the work reported in this paper.
Ni
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
25.30
8.33 This work was supported by Shenzhen Science and Technology
Program (Grant No. KQTD2017033016491218).
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