• SP-A. Surface nanostructures for unprecedented lateral device performance
This work package has demonstrated several new technologies based on nanostructures applied to lateral power devices. In particular, a novel device concept to address the intrinsic trade-off between electron density and mobility, based on a multi-channel tri-gate structure. High conductivity was obtained by vertically stacking several high-mobility channels to enhance the carrier density. A simultaneous electrostatic control over all channels is achieved by a 3-dimensional gate electrode (tri-gate) around all channels. The multi-channel structure was judiciously designed to yield a small sheet-resistance of 80 Ω/sq., using only four 2DEG channels, that resulted in an equivalent resistivity of only 1.1 mΩ·mm. Our work shows that whereas conventional field plates (FPs) are not suited to increase breakdown voltage in high-conductivity multi-channels, slanted tri-gates offer better electric-field management inside the device. Power devices made with 15-nm-wide nanowires were shown to exhibit ultra-low specific on-resistances of 0.46 mΩ·cm-2, enhancement-mode operation, breakdown voltages as high as 1300 V, and a record figure-of-merit of 4.6 GW/cm2 for d-mode devices and 3.8 GW/cm2 for e-mode devices. These results significantly outperform conventional devices and demonstrate the enormous potential of multi-channel devices for future power solutions. These works were presented in the 2019 IEEE International Electron Devices Meeting, accepted in Nature Electronics 2021 and received the best paper award at the IEEE ISPSD (Charitat Award).
• SP-B. Embedded nanostructures for new vertical devices
This work package has significantly contributed to the development of vertical GaN power devices on cost-effective large-scale Silicon substrates. After optimizing the growth, doping and device fabrication, our group showed remarkable electron mobility of 720 cm2/Vs for a 4-μm-thick GaN drift layer. This work has resulted in the demonstration of vertical GaN P-i-N diodes on 6” Silicon substrate with a high breakdown voltage of 820 V, corresponding to an excellent average electric field of over 2 MV/cm, even without edge termination, and state-of-the-art figure of merit of 2.0 GW/cm2. Based on this optimization, we have demonstrated the first GaN-on-Si MOSFET, using a 6.7-μm-thick n-p-n heterostructure grown on 6-inch silicon substrate. The devices consisted of trench-gate MOSFET in a quasi-vertical configuration, exhibiting enhancement-mode operation with a threshold voltage of 6.3 V and a high OFF-state breakdown voltage of 645 V with a 4-μm-thick drift layer. Our group also demonstrated for the first time a fully-vertical GaN power MOSFET on silicon. We developed a robust fabrication method based on selective and local removal of the Si substrate as well as the resistive and defective GaN buffer layers. High-performance fully-vertical GaN-on-Si MOSFETs were presented for the first time, with low RON and high VBR. Our results reveal a major step toward the realization of high-performance GaN vertical power devices on cost-effective Si substrates.
• SP-C. Embedded nanostructures for advanced thermal management
This work package demonstrated several technologies for cooling of electronics. In particular, we showed that co-designing microfluidics and electronics into the same semiconductor substrate, to produce a monolithically-integrated manifold microchannel (mMMC) cooling structure, provides efficiency beyond the state-of-the-art. Our results show that heat fluxes exceeding 1.7 kW/cm2 can be cooled down using only 0.57 W/cm2 of pumping power. We observed an unprecedented coefficient of performance (>104) for single-phase water-cooling of heat fluxes exceeding 1 kW/cm2, corresponding to a 50-fold increase compared to straight microchannels, as well as a remarkably high average Nusselt number of 16. The proposed cooling technology enables further miniaturization of electronics, potentially extending Moore’s law and greatly reducing energy consumption worldwide. These results were published in Nature (Sept. 2020), together with one patent application and received the best paper awards in IEEE ITherm 2020 and Therminic. In addition, this work was covered by many mainstream news outlets, such as Scientific American, Le Figaro, Le Temps, NRC, IEEE Spectrum, New Scientist, Nature podcast, Olhar Digital, RTS (swiss radio).
