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. 2022 May 21;13(5):800.
doi: 10.3390/mi13050800.

Impact of the Semiconductor Defect Density on Solution-Processed Flexible Schottky Barrier Diodes

Julio C Tinoco  1   2 , Samuel A Hernandez  1 , María de la Luz Olvera  3 , Magali Estrada  3 , Rodolfo García  4 , Andrea G Martinez-Lopez  1   2
Affiliations

Impact of the Semiconductor Defect Density on Solution-Processed Flexible Schottky Barrier Diodes

Julio C Tinoco et al. Micromachines (Basel). .

Abstract

Schottky barrier diodes, developed by low-cost techniques and low temperature processes (LTP-SBD), have gained attention for different kinds of novel applications, including flexible electronic fabrication. This work analyzes the behavior of the I-V characteristic of solution processed, ZnO Schottky barrier diodes, fabricated at a low temperature. It is shown that the use of standard extraction methods to determine diode parameters in these devices produce significant dispersion of the ideality factor with values from 2.2 to 4.1, as well as a dependence on the diode area without physical meaning. The analysis of simulated I-V characteristic of LTP-SBD, and its comparison with experimental measurements, confirmed that it is necessary to consider the presence of a density of states (DOS) in the semiconductor gap, to understand specific changes observed in their performance, with respect to standard SBDs. These changes include increased values of Rs, as well as its dependence on bias, an important reduction of the diode current and small rectification values (RR). Additionally, it is shown that the standard extraction methodologies cannot be used to obtain diode parameters of LTP-SBD, as it is necessary to develop adequate parameter extraction methodologies for them.

Keywords: Schottky barrier diodes; semiconductor defects; solution-processing electronics; zinc oxide films.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Plot of the JD–VD characteristic for the different length devices. The diode area is defined as A = L2.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Comparison of the extracted values of the barrier height using the different methods.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Comparison of the extracted values of the ideality factor.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Comparison of the extracted values of the series resistance using the different methods.
Figure 5
Figure 5
I–V characteristic for the simulated SBD considering different densities of localized states for NB equal to (a) 5 × 1016 and (b) 5 × 1018 cm−3. For comparison, defect free devices (NTA = NTD = 0) are considered.
Figure 6
Figure 6
Comparison of the rectification ratio (RR) vs. the defect densities, for both NB values used in the simulations.
Figure 7
Figure 7
Comparison of the electron concentration (ne) vs. the semiconductor film position (x), for both NB values used in the simulations.
Figure 8
Figure 8
Calculated series resistance vs. forward bias, for NB of 5 × 1016 cm−3. In the inset, the corresponding plot for NB of 5 × 1018 cm−3 is shown.
Figure 9
Figure 9
Plot of the dVD/dln(ID) vs ID, used for η and RS extraction in the Cheung extraction method.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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