A study of the dependence of effective schottky barrier height in ni silicide/n-si on the thickness of the antimony interlayer for high performance n-channel mosfets

In this paper, the effective electron Schottky barrier height (ФBn) of the Ni silicide/nsilicon (100) interface was studied in accordance with different thicknesses of the antimony (Sb) interlayer for high performance n-channel MOSFETs. The Sb interlayers, varying its thickness from 2 nm to 10 nm, were deposited by radio frequency (RF) sputtering on lightly doped n-type Si (100), followed by the in situ deposition of Ni/TiN (15/10 nm). It is found that the sample with a thicker Sb interlayer shows stronger ohmic characteristics than the control sample without the Sb interlayer. These results show that the effective ФBn is considerably lowered by the influence of the Sb interlayer. However, the current level difference between Schottky diodes fabricated with Sb/Ni/TiN (8/15/10 nm) and Sb/Ni/TiN (10/15/10 nm) structures is almost same. Therefore, considering the process time and cost, it can be said that the optimal thickness of the Sb interlayer is 8 nm. The effective ФBn of 0.076 eV was achieved for the Schottky diode with Sb/Ni/TiN (8/15/10 nm) structure. Therefore, this technology is suitable for high performance n-channel MOSFETs.