Solid-State Electronics 53 (2009) 341–348

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Solid-State Electronics
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/sse

Temperature dependent analytical model for current–voltage characteristics

of AlGaN/GaN power HEMT
M.A. Huque a,*, S.A. Eliza a, T. Rahman a, H.F. Huq b, S.K. Islam a
a
Min H. Kao Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN 37996-2100, USA
b
Department of Electrical Engineering, The University of Texas-Pan American, Edinburg, TX 78541-2999, USA

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

Article history: A temperature dependent analytical model has been presented for AlGaN/GaN power high electron
Received 20 July 2008 mobility transistor (HEMT) to predict the DC performance at elevated temperatures. In this model the
Received in revised form 11 December 2008 effects of temperature on band gap energy, sheet carrier density, threshold voltage, carrier mobility,
Accepted 4 January 2009
and saturation velocity are taken into consideration. Channel length modulation in the saturation region
Available online 14 February 2009
of operation and spontaneous and piezoelectric polarization induced charges at the AlGaN/GaN hetero-
The review of this paper was arranged by interface are also included in this model. Temperature- and bias-dependent on-wafer current–voltage
Prof. E. Calleja measurements from 300 K to 500 K were carried out to verify the developed model. DC measurements
and model predictions are presented for an AlGaN/GaN power HEMT fabricated on SiC substrate. The
Keywords: developed model shows good agreement with the measured data for a wide range of temperatures.
AlGaN/GaN Ó 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Power HEMT
Temperature model

1. Introduction power HEMTs, fabricated on SiC substrate, take the advantage of

In recent years GaN-based high electron mobility transistors
(HEMTs) have been considered to be the excellent key device for
the simultaneous realization of high-power and high-frequency
systems in high-temperature environments [1–7]. These devices
emerged as strong candidates for wireless base-station amplifiers,
power electronic circuits, radars operating in extreme environ-
ments, and fully integrated wireless sensors for industrial process
monitoring and control. Low intrinsic carrier generation with the
increase of temperature and high breakdown field, due to wide
band gap energy, make GaN the right material for high-power
and high-temperature systems. In comparison with other broadly
researched wide band gap materials (except Diamond), GaN has
higher electron mobility, which leads to high-frequency operation
of GaN-based HEMT devices. Larger sheet carrier density along
with high saturation velocity allows the AlGaN/GaN HEMT devices
to operate with higher current density. Compared to Silicon Car-
bide (SiC) FETs, GaN HEMTs have lower specific on-resistance be-
cause of the high-density 2D electron gas (2-DEG) (>1013 cm2)
and high electron mobility (>1500 cm2/V s) [8]. GaN devices are
also suitable for high-frequency microwave applications due to
the high saturation velocity in the GaN channel [9]. AlGaN/GaN
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 8659749882; fax: +1 8659745483.
E-mail addresses: mhuque@utk.edu (M.A. Huque), aminul94@yahoo.com (M.A.
Huque).
high thermal conductivity of SiC to offer high-power, high-fre-
quency device solution at elevated temperatures.
High-temperature environments include industrial (process
and chemical), power (turbines and nuclear), aerospace (turbines),
and automotive applications (internal combustion engines). In
industrial environment high-temperature wireless sensors can
provide improved process visibility and energy efficiency. At-
tempts are at a nascent stage to develop fully integrated wireless
sensors for high-temperature environments. But AlGaN/GaN de-
vices fabricated on SiC substrate have the potential to be engaged
in building integrated systems with sensing, signal processing,
power amplification, and wireless telemetry on a common sub-
strate. The first step towards building such a system is to develop
simple but accurate device models to simulate nonlinear circuits
for a wide temperature range. A good model can save scores of pro-
cessing time and cost by reducing several iterations of a design. Al-
GaN/GaN HEMTs are relatively newer field effect transistors
compared to Si or GaAs based FETs. There exists a substantial
amount of work on analytical and empirical modeling of these de-
vices. However, very few of these models address power devices,
especially including the temperature effects [5–7,10,11]. Chang
et al. [10] reported a numerical study of the DC drain current char-
acteristics of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs where the authors have consid-
ered the temperature effect on energy band offset and
spontaneous and piezoelectric polarization. In general numerical
simulations are very time consuming and difficult to incorporate

0038-1101/$ - see front matter Ó 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.sse.2009.01.004
342 M.A. Huque et al. / Solid-State Electronics 53 (2009) 341–348
Fig. 1. AlGaN/GaN power HEMT device structure.
in circuit simulators. Lee and Webb [7] presented a temperature
dependent large signal model for HEMTs on SiC substrate. This
model includes thermal, RF dispersion, and bias-dependent capac-
itance model elements. The approach proposed in this work is to
modify the cubic nonlinear model developed by Curtice and Etten-
berg [12]. Curtice model was originally proposed for GaAs FET,
where device characteristics were generated empirically. Such
modeling approach does not provide the opportunity to under-
stand device operation from the physical point of view. Huq and Is-
lam [5,6] presented an analytical temperature dependent model
based on modified charge control equations which were first pro-
posed by Chang and Fetterman [13]. In this simple model piezo-
electric effect was not considered. Besides, the model was
compared with the published measurement results of relatively
older AlGaN/GaN devices. In recent years significant improvements
in GaN material processing techniques have been achieved. Hence
models need to be compared with the test results from relatively
newer AlGaN/GaN devices. Chang et al. [11] presented a thermal
model for the static current characteristics of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs
that includes the self-heating effect on various device parameters.
But the authors have verified the model only with the published
room temperature measurement data.
The aim of this work is to develop an analytical current–voltage
model for AlGaN/GaN power HEMT that incorporates the temper-
ature effects on device performance. The model presented here in-
cludes the effects of temperature variation on band gap energy,
sheet carrier density, threshold voltage, carrier mobility, and satu-
ration velocity. Comparison of this analytical model with the mea-
sured data at a wide temperature range (300 K–500 K)
demonstrates the validity of this model to predict the performance
of AlGaN/GaN power HEMTs in extreme environment. In this pa-
per, Section 2 describes the structure of the AlGaN/GaN power
HEMT under consideration. Temperature effects on various mate-
rial and device parameters have been discussed in Section 3. This
section also describes the temperature dependent current–voltage
model formulation. Model results and comparison with the mea-
sured data are included in Section 4 which is followed by conclu-
sions in Section 5.
2. Device structure
AlGaN/GaN HEMT investigated in this work is primarily devel-
oped for power applications. The cross-sectional conceptual view
of the HEMT device considered in this work is shown in Fig. 1. It
is grown on SiC substrate for high-temperature operation. Larger
gate-drain separation is provided to achieve high breakdown volt-
age. This structure consists of a 2 lm thick GaN buffer layer over-
grown with nominally undoped 20 nm AlGaN layer. The source and
drain contacts are ohmic, whereas gate is composed of a Schottky
barrier with gold as the gate material. Ohmic contacts for the
source and the drain are made of n+GaN and gold. Due to the band-
gap difference between AlGaN and GaN a potential well is formed
in the GaN layer at the interface. The spontaneous polarization and
the piezoelectric polarization due to lattice mismatch between Al-
GaN and GaN create positive sheet charges in AlGaN at the heter-
ointerface. Due to the positive sheet charges, electrons appear and
remain confined in the potential well forming the 2-DEG [14]. In
AlGaN/GaN HEMTs, the 2-DEG conduction channel exists even
with zero gate bias. The concentration of the 2-DEG in the channel
can be modulated by varying the voltage applied at the external
gate terminal.
3. Temperature dependent model formulation
An accurate and robust temperature model is imperative for
predicting the device performance at elevated temperatures. Most
recently Li and Wang [9] presented a physics based model for Al-
GaN/GaN HEMT devices which is based on the charge control
method. This model incorporated the Fermi energy (EF) variation
of GaN with applied gate-to-source voltage and the effect of elec-
tron drift velocity overshoot. In the current work, Li’s model has
been further modified to reflect the temperature effects in the sta-
tic characteristics of the power HEMT devices.
The charge control equation has been used to represent the
sheet carrier concentration of the 2-DEG formed at the heterointer-
face of the HEMT.
e
ns ðxÞ ¼ ðV gs  V th ðTÞ  V c ðx; TÞÞ ð1Þ
qðdd þ DdðTÞÞ
where e and dd are the permittivity and the thickness of AlGaN
layer, respectively, Dd is the average distance of the 2-DEG from
the AlGaN/GaN interface, Vgs is the applied gate-to-source voltage,
Vc(x) is the potential at any point in the channel due to the applied
drain voltage and Vth is defined as,
V th ðTÞ ¼ V off ðTÞ þ EF ðTÞ ð2Þ
Here, Voff is the threshold voltage of the device and EF is the Fermi
level with reference to the lower end of the GaN conduction band.
Voff is defined as,
rpz ðTÞdd qNd d2d
V off ðTÞ ¼ /B  DEc ðTÞ   ð3Þ
e 2e
where, /B is the Schottky barrier height, DEc is the conduction band
discontinuity between AlGaN and GaN, rpz is the polarization in-
duced sheet charge density at the heterointerface, and Nd is the
doping density in the AlGaN layer. The power HEMT device consid-
ered for this work does not possess any supply layer and the AlGaN
layer is unintentionally doped. Hence Nd is assumed to be zero for
 M.A. Huque et al. / Solid-State Electronics 53 (2009) 341–348 343

the rest of this model formulation. In this analysis, rpz is calculated EAlGaN
g ðT; mÞ ¼ mEAlN GaN
g ðTÞ þ ð1  mÞEg ðTÞ þ mð1  mÞ ð6Þ
considering both the spontaneous and the nonlinear piezoelectric
polarizations [15]. The band gap energy for AlN and GaN is given by [20,21]
The temperature dependent parameters, Fermi energy, energy T2
band offset, average distance of the channel charge from the inter- EAlN
g ðTÞ ¼ 6:34  1:799  10
3
 ð7Þ
T þ 1462
face, polarization, and mobility, are first analyzed to find the tem-
perature effect. GaN 4 T2
Eg ðTÞ ¼ 3:582  9:09  10  ð8Þ
T þ 830
3.1. Fermi energy
3.3. Quantum correction
Fermi energy in GaN varies with the sheet charge density, ns
[16] and is defined by the empirical equation [17], Schrodinger and Poisson equations are solved self-consistently
to calculate the average distance of the 2-DEG from the AlGaN/
EF ¼ k 1 þ k2 n1=2
s þ k3 ns ð4Þ
GaN interface. In previous modeling approaches a constant dis-
where k1, k2, and k3 are temperature dependent parameters which tance was assumed without considering the temperature effect.
are obtained from three different values of ns’s and corresponding This work includes the analytic calculation of the changes in the
EF’s [17]. Table 1 shows the calculated values of k1, k2, and k3 for average distance of the 2-DEG from the heterointerface due to
three different temperatures. the temperature variation. The average distances of the 2-DEG at
different temperatures are shown in Fig. 2.
3.2. Energy band offset
3.4. Spontaneous and piezoelectric polarization
Conduction band discontinuity (DEC) at the AlGaN/GaN hetero-
interface determines the two-dimensional electron gas density in In AlGaN/GaN-based heterostructures, large spontaneous and
the HEMT channel. Due to higher DEC and polarization charges in piezoelectric polarization fields exist due to the material properties
AlGaN/GaN HEMTs, higher 2-DEG density exists in the channel of AlGaN/GaN [18,22]. Because of this property, 2-DEG formed
even with zero gate bias voltage. In AlmGa1mN/GaN HEMT, DEC with very high sheet carrier concentrations even without any
is expressed as [18], intentional doping [23]. Although the spontaneous polarization is
very strong in Group III nitrides, the pyroelectric coefficients,
DEC ðT; mÞ ¼ 0:75ðEAlGaN
g ðT; mÞ  EGaN
g ðT; mÞÞ ð5Þ describing the changes of the spontaneous polarization with tem-
where m is assumed to be the Al mole fraction in AlGaN, T is the lat- perature, are measured to be very small [24,25]. Chang et al. [10]
tice temperature and Eg is band gap energy. The band gap of the al- showed that the effect of pyroelectric coefficients on the channel
loy AlmGa1mN has been approximated by the Varshni formula [19] current at high temperature is negligible.
The piezoelectric polarization Ppz in the direction of z-axis can
be determined by the elastic and the piezoelectric constants [14].
Table 1
Values of k1, k2, and k3 at different temperatures. Ppz is also found to be nonlinear in terms of the alloy composition.
To the best of our knowledge, there is no published report on the
Temperature (K) k1 (V) k2  107 (V cm) K3  1014 (V cm2)
temperature dependence of piezoelectric polarization. Since it is
300 0.1526 3.4622 5.4733 expected to be very small as in spontaneous polarization, the tem-
400 0.2122 4.3243 9.0229
perature dependence of piezoelectric polarization was disregarded
500 0.2739 5.1828 12.536
in this model development.

Fig. 2. Quantum correction (Dd) as a function of temperature.

344 M.A. Huque et al. / Solid-State Electronics 53 (2009) 341–348

pðV V þV ðTÞþIds ðTÞðR0 ðTÞRD ÞÞ Rt

3.5. Mobility Here, kðTÞ ¼ ds gs th2dn0 ðTÞ ; R0 ðTÞ ¼ G01ðTÞ and C 2 ðt 0 Þ ¼ 10
dt
t2 ln ð1tÞ
. Eq. (15) includes the channel length modulation that be-
Mobility is one of the most prominent parameter that signifi- comes prominent in the saturation region.
cantly alters the transistor characteristics with the variation of
temperature. Several empirical formulas have been proposed to 4. Simulation results
model the GaN low-field mobility as a function of temperature
[9,26]. Model presented in Ref. [26] is mainly for low-field mobil- The temperature dependent current–voltage model developed
ity in bulk doped GaN material. The 2-DEG mobility is a function in the previous section has been employed to simulate the Al-
of the channel charge density, ns which in turn is a function of GaN/GaN power HEMT device shown in Fig. 1. Simulation results
gate-to-source voltage. In this paper the low-field mobility de- along with the test results are presented in this section for purpose
fined by a phenomenological model presented in [9] has been of the model verification. Experiments were conducted with in-
used. house high-temperature testing facilities. Comparisons of model
p1 generated results with the test data confirmed the effectiveness
l0 ¼ ð9Þ of this model to predict AlGaN/GaN power HEMTs DC behavior at
p2 þ ðp3 þ V gs Þ2
elevated temperatures.
where p1, p2, and p3 are extracted parameters. The 2-DEG mobility
at different temperatures have been calculated using Eq. (10) which 4.1. Threshold voltage
were developed based on the empirical model presented in [27].
 1:6 Threshold voltage is one of the key parameters that control the
T
lT ¼ l300K ð10Þ switching behavior of any semiconductor device. Variation of
300 threshold voltage with temperature for the HEMT device under
To formulate the temperature dependent current–voltage charac- test has been plotted in Fig. 3. The measured data shows slightly
teristics of a device, all these temperature effects need to be consid- greater increase in threshold voltage with the increase of temper-
ered simultaneously. Subsequent sections present the formulation ature compared to the one predicted by the model. In this analysis,
of AlGaN/GaN power HEMT’s temperature dependent DC current– we were unable to add the temperature effect on the Schottky bar-
voltage model. rier height and on the polarization induced sheet charge due to the
lack of test data and hence Au–AlGaN Schottky barrier height was
3.6. Current–voltage characteristics considered to be constant with the variation of temperature. In
practice, barrier height will vary with the variation of temperature
The channel current is expressed by the current density equa- [30]. Tests results show very small change in threshold voltage
tion presented in [28] where temperature effects are included in (0.1 V) of the device with the increase in temperature from
the electron drift velocity, v(x,T) and channel charge density, ns(x,T) 300 K to 500 K.
terms.
4.2. Current–voltage characteristics
Ids ðTÞ ¼ Zqmðx; TÞns ðx; TÞ ð11Þ
where Z is the gate width of the device. The empirical Giblin– The device output characteristics at 300 K for different gate-to-
Scherer–Wierich (GSW) formula, which was proposed by Giblin source and drain-to-source biasing conditions are shown in Fig. 4.
et al. [29] is used to model the velocity-field dependence, Device dimensions and constants used for this analytical calcula-
tion are showed in Table 2. Experimental results at the room tem-
mðx; TÞ ¼ mdsat ð1  enðxÞ=nc ðTÞ Þ ð12Þ perature are also incorporated in the same figure for comparison.
where nc ðTÞ ¼ mdsat =lðTÞ; mdsat is the saturation velocity and l is the The model generated results closely follow the test data especially
low-field mobility. when the gate voltage is close to zero. Difference between the
Combining Eqs. (1)–(4) and (12) with Eq. (11) and following the model and the test results increases at low biasing points. The pri-
similar methodology as in [13], the drain current expression before mary reason for this mismatch is the leakage current which be-
saturation can be derived as, comes comparable to the drain forward current in such operating
Z tL
condition.
dt Current–voltage characteristics at elevated temperatures are
Ids ðTÞ ¼ nc ðTÞLG0 ð13Þ
t0 tðx; TÞ2 ln ð1  tðx; TÞÞ calculated by incorporating temperature dependent model param-
eters in Eqs. (13) and (15). These analytical results along with the
where G0 ðTÞ ¼ eðmÞZ
dðTÞ
msat
; dðTÞ ¼ dd þ DdðTÞ and tðx; TÞ ¼
Ids ðTÞ high-temperature measurements are shown in Fig. 5 for zero gate-
G0 ðTÞðV gs V th ðTÞV c ðxÞÞ
.
to-source biasing. At higher temperatures model overestimated
At the onset of saturation i.e. when the drain voltage reaches the device drain current. Fig. 6 shows similar comparison for differ-
the saturation value Vds,sat, channel electrons approach velocity sat- ent gate-to-source biasing at 500 K. From Figs. 5 and 6 it is ob-
ds ðTÞ
uration. To calculate saturation current and voltage, g d ¼ @I@V was served that this model overestimates the test results at higher
ds
calculated from Eq. (11) and set to zero, which results in temperature especially with gate biasing closer to the device
Ids;sat ðTÞ pinch-off voltage. Two main reasons that might have contributed
t L;sat ðTÞ ¼ ¼1 ð14Þ to this mismatch are discussed in the following sections.
G0 ðTÞðV gs  V th ðTÞ  V ds;sat þ Ids ðTÞRD Þ
In this model, for all temperatures, a constant bulk resistance
Here Vds,sat and Ids,sat are the saturation voltage and the drain current value was used to model the region between the drain and the
for a constant gate voltage. To calculate the drain current for drain side edge of the gate. Since the experimental data for this
V ds > V ds;sat two-dimensional Poisson’s equation was solved in [13] work has been extracted from an AlGaN/GaN HEMT device
using necessary boundary conditions. The temperature dependent which was originally developed for high-voltage applications,
current equation in the saturation region can be expressed as, the separation between the drain and the gate terminals is
  rather large. Hence the drain-gate resistance is quite large and
nC ðTÞG0 ðTÞ 2dðTÞ 1
Ids ðTÞ ¼ L sinh kðTÞ ð15Þ is expected to vary with the change in temperature. According
C 2 ðt0 Þ p
 M.A. Huque et al. / Solid-State Electronics 53 (2009) 341–348 345

Fig. 3. Threshold voltage variation with temperature.

Fig. 4. Ids–Vds characteristics at 300 K for Vgs = 3 V–0 V.

Table 2
Model parameters values considered in this work.

Parameters Value Parameters Value

Thickness of AlGaN layer, dd (nm) 20 Drain resistance, RD (X) 23
Gate width, Z (lm) 100 Al mole fraction, m 0.46
Gate length, L (lm) 0.2 Critical electric field, nC 0.5n0
Saturation drift velocity, msat (cm/s) 2.5  107 Mobility parameter, p1 (cm2 V/s) 0.6e4
Permittivity of AlGaN, e 9.325e0 Mobility parameter, p2 (V2) 3
Source resistance, RS (X) 10 Mobility parameter, p3 (V) 7

to Refs. [11,31], the drain-gate resistance increases with the in-
crease in temperature. In our study by setting higher resistance
values at higher temperatures better matching between the
model and the test results were observed. Due to the absence
of appropriate test data and proper model, temperature effect
on the bulk resistance was not included in this AlGaN/GaN
high-temperature model.
The threshold voltage model used in this analysis is a very
approximate one. Due to the lack of test data, temperature effects
on the Schottky barrier height and on the polarization induced
sheet charge were not added into this model. As shown in Fig. 3,
this model predicts less increase in threshold voltage with the in-
crease of temperature compared to the experimental value. By
using a more accurate threshold voltage model, the accuracy of this
346 M.A. Huque et al. / Solid-State Electronics 53 (2009) 341–348

Fig. 5. Ids–Vds characteristics at different ambient temperatures for Vgs = 0 V.

Fig. 6. Ids–Vds characteristics at 500 K for different gate-to-source biasing.

temperature dependent analytical model can be improved. In our
study an empirical model for the temperature dependent threshold
voltage was extracted by linear fitting of the experimental data and
used to generate the Ids–Vds characteristics at different tempera-
tures for different gate biasing voltages. These simulation results
show that by more accurate threshold voltage model better match-
ing can be achieved in the saturation region of the device forward
characteristics.
Another possible reason for the mismatch between simulation
and test results is the increase in device leakage current at elevated
temperatures. Fig. 7 shows the measured transfer characteristics of
the AlGaN/GaN HEMT device at three different temperatures. At
high temperature (500 K), leakage current superimposes on the
drain current, which has not yet been incorporated in this model.
Fig. 8 shows the DC transconductance as a function of the gate-
to-source biasing at different temperatures. This proposed model
quite accurately predicts the overall trend of the transconductance.
There are small mismatches between the experimental and the
model results which increase with the rise of temperature due to
the increased leakage current as shown in Fig. 7 and bulk
resistances.
In power devices the channel temperature might differ signifi-
cantly from the die temperature depending on power dissipation
in the device and the thermal impedances of the package and dif-
ferent layers beneath the channel. The temperature rise due to self-
heating can be written as,
X
T ch ¼ T d þ Pdiss Rthi ð16Þ
i
where Tch and Td represent channel and die temperatures, respec-
tively, Pdiss is the power (IdsVds) dissipated in the channel and Rthi
is the thermal impedance of the i-th layer. Thermal impedance is in-
versely proportional to the thermal conductivity of the material.
The device used for validating the model has GaN channel layer
grown on SiC substrate. SiC has much higher thermal conductivity
(3.4 W/cm K) than that of GaN (1.6 W/cm K). Following the meth-
 M.A. Huque et al. / Solid-State Electronics 53 (2009) 341–348 347

Fig. 7. Measured transferred characteristics at different temperatures for Vds = 10 V.

Fig. 8. Temperature effect on transconductance, gm for Vgs = 0 V and Vds = 10 V.

ods presented in [32,33] the Rth calculated for the channel layer is
50.78 X assuming the substrate (SiC) temperature as 300 K. The Al-
GaN/GAN HEMT device considered for this work does not show any
noticeable self-heating effect (i.e. negative output conductance) up
to 15 V drain-to-source voltages (Fig. 4 and Fig 5). This device is pri-
marily designed as power device and is intended for high-voltage
applications. Accurate measurement of the thermal impedance of
this device structure is needed to better model the device behavior
at wide temperature range.
5. Conclusion
This paper presents a physics based temperature dependent DC
model for AlGaN/GaN power HEMT. This analytical model is based
on the charge control analysis, into which the variations of Fermi
energy, polarization charges, and channel length modulation have
been successfully incorporated. The temperature dependencies of
the 2-DEG parameters and the carrier mobility have been carefully
investigated. It has been found that the change in the low-field
mobility with temperature is the major contributor to the variation
of device performance. The temperature variation of band gap
energies for GaN and AlGaN materials and hence the conduction
band offset at the heterojunction, the effective width of 2-DEG
density, and Fermi energy have been incorporated in the model.
This model accurately predicts the device current–voltage charac-
teristics for a wide temperature range. The main reasons for the
differences between the experimental data and the model results
are the increased leakage current, changes in threshold voltage
and bulk resistances at higher temperatures, which have not yet
been incorporated in the model. This model provides a useful tool
for analyzing DC characteristics of AlGaN/GaN power HEMT at ex-
treme environment. It provides a detailed insight of the device
physics and effects of temperature on various device parameters.
These parameters can be optimized to achieve better device
348 M.A. Huque et al. / Solid-State Electronics 53 (2009) 341–348

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