Demonstration of a 2 kV Al0.85Ga0.15N Schottky Barrier Diode With Improved On-Current and Ideality Factor

In this letter, we report on demonstrating a Schottky barrier diode (SBD) with high reverse blocking voltage by incorporating an ultra-wide bandgap semiconductor Al _0.85 Ga _0.15 N channel. Benefited from the lower activation energy of the Si in GaN, the net carrier concentration of Al _0.85 Ga _0.15 N can be essentially enhanced to 2 × cm ^-3 level with surface roughness of 0.33 nm. Due to the good material property, a reverse blocking voltage of 2 kV and room temperature ideality factor of 2.3 are demonstrated. Combined with the significantly improved on-current and on/off ratio of more than 10 ⁶ when compared with other AlN SBDs, Al _0.85 Ga _0.15 N turns out to be a competitive AlN counterpart by considering the compromise among ultra-wide bandgap, dopant activation, and material property.