Parameter Shift of Quasi-Vertical GaN-on-Si Schottky Barrier Diodes Under On-State Forward-Current (2–4 kA/cm²) Stress

In this article, we carry out the parameter shift of quasi-vertical GaN-on-Si Schottky barrier diodes (SBDs) under ON-state stress with a high forward current of 2–4 kA/cm2. Turn-on voltage ${V}_{{\mathrm {\mathbf {on}}}}$ , ON-resistance $R_{ON}$ , reverse leakage current ${I}_{\text {reverse}}$ , Schottky barrier height $\phi $ , and ideality factor ${n}$ were monitored during the ON-state stress. From semilog scale, all the subthreshold leakage currents increase evidently for a stress voltage of 5 V and a stress time of 50–1000 s. Most of the extracted ${V}_{{\mathrm {\mathbf {on}}}}$ are nearly unchanged for all the 2.5–4.5-V stress and decrease by −0.065 to −0.085 V for 5-V/50–1000-s stress. $R_{ON}$ first increases and then decreases, and the maximum $R_{ON}$ shift is only 3.8%. The stressed devices are measured 24 h after the stress, and it is found that $R_{ON}$ shift under high-current stress is recoverable. The reverse leakage current increases from 2.97 $\times \,\,10^{-{3}}$ to $7.93\times 10^{-3}$ A/cm2 at a reverse bias of −100 V after 5-V/1000-s stress. The corresponding $\phi $ decreases from 0.82 to 0.53–0.58 eV, and ${n}$ is increased from 1.03 to 1.87–2.57, indicating the parameter shift occurs at the anode/ ${n}$ -GaN interface. Experiments and analysis demonstrate that the device characteristics of quasi-vertical GaN-on-Si SBDs can be degraded to a certain extent under high-current/long-time stress.