Download Topic Contribution to Silicon High Impedance and High Frequency

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Contribution to Silicon High Impedance and High Frequency devices
characterization such as AttoF capacitors, sub 14nm MOSFET and advanced
Bipolars
Telecommunication standards multiplication and sophistication involve an increase
of silicon integrated transceiver systems complexity both at RF (3G,4G,5G) and
mmW (W-HDMI, imagery, radar, sensors networks) frequencies. Nowadays, thoses
RX/TX systems have to be capable to support several frequency bands and to
synthezise reconfigurable agile functions. In that context, very low capacitance
values in the range of aF (very High Impedances) become mandatory for Digitally
Tuned Oscillator design. In addition, the scaling down of silicon technologies
requires the development of nanodevices (sub 14nm MOSFET and advanced
Bipolar) presenting impedances of few kOhms. Consequently, it becomes very
difficult to measure with enough accuracy thoses devices using conventional vector
network analyzers. As a matter of fact, these equipments are dedicated to devices
measurement presenting impedances near to 50Ohms. At present time, no high
frequency commercial solution exists in that field to cover this need. One solution
would be to develop normalized measurement system at arbitrary impedances and
higher than 50Ohms. It becomes mandatory to shift reference impedance of vector
network analyzer around impedances of interest. In that context and to address this
need, measurement tools are going to be developed with associated methodologies in
the frame of an ITN (Marie Curie Initial Training Networks) project called
Nanomicrowave aiming Microwave Nanotechnology for Semiconductor and Life
Sciences. A summary of this project objective is given below.
To contribute to this research topic, STMicroelectronics is proposing a PhD as part
of this ITN project. The student will collaborate with IEMN laboratory and Agilent
company involved in the development of few GHz high impedance measurement
tool. The contribution will address:
Silicon test structure definition, design and implementation on
advanced silicon technologies for high impedance RF measurement
tools calibration aiming on wafer measurement
High impedance devices (aF capacitors, sub 14nm MOSFET,
Advanced Bipolar) test structures design and implementation
compatible with developed measurement tools
Silicon devices model extraction
Elementary Digitally Tuned Capacitances development in the range of
aF
DCO demonstrators aF based
First trial of Silicon integrated interferometers covering few GHz and
associated to developed measurement tools to shift 50Ohms
characteristics impedance to higher one
This work will be also achieved in collaboration with ExCELSIOR project driven by
IEMN laboratory aiming the development of Nanoscale tester.
(excelsior-ncc.iemn.univ-lille1.fr)
Master student with competencies in
Microelectronics
Semiconductor Physics
High Frequencies
Network analyzer
STMicroelectronics Crolles France
[email protected]
33 4 76 92 66 65
Nanomicrowave ITN objective summary
Microwave technologies have a tremendous impact in modern societies as they constitute the basis of
widespread communication, remote sensing and navigation systems. In addition, they are widely used as power
sources in food and materials industries, in plasma processing techniques in the semiconductor industry and as
surgical tools in medicine. In all these applications engineers make use of the special propagation properties of
microwaves, their short wave length, its wide bandwidth and the existence of molecular, atomic or nuclear
resonances at those frequencies. A common aspect of all existing applications is that they exploit the properties
of microwaves interacting with objects of a size comparable or greater to their wave lengths, i.e. centimetres to
millimetres. With the advent of Nanotechnologies the possibility to explore the interactions of microwaves
with much smaller objects (micrometres to nanometres) is emerging as a fascinating and exciting field of
research and technology development. In these conditions the near field properties of microwaves (relevant at
distances several times smaller than their wave length) together with the relevance of quantum and semi
classical interactions opens the access to phenomena that were completely inaccessible just a few years ago.
These new phenomena are quickly being better understood and are expected to give rise to new applications in
the short-mid term on fields of application such as electronics, biology, spintronics or medicine.
The major objective of this project is to train a new generation of multidisciplinary researchers in
the field of nanoscale microwave technologies and related emerging applications. These multidisciplinary
researchers will acquire a solid multidisciplinary scientific and technical training in the field of nanoscale
microwave technologies enabling them to generate new knowledge beyond the current state of the art
and with the skills to transfer this knowledge into novel microwave applications in the semiconductor
and life science sectors, specifically, in nano-electronics, nano-spintronics, nano-biology and nanomedicine. In addition, the researchers of the network will receive a practical training on transferable
skills enabling them to access job positions in the private and public sector from where they can foster
the development of new products and projects based on nanoscale microwave technologies
B.2.2. S&T Quality of the Proposed Scientific and Technological Area and Research Program
The research program of the NANOMICROWAVE network will be centred on the science and technology
of microwaves at the nanoscale and of related emerging applications in the fields of electronics, spintronics,
biology, and medicine. Microwaves are understood in the present project as electromagnetic waves with a frequency
from 1 GHz to 100 GHz and a wave length in free space from cm to mm.
The interaction of microwaves with matter and structures is determined on the one hand by the characteristic size of the
structures, which is determined by their physical dimensions or by the homogeneity of its composition. On the other hand
it is determined by the material properties and its capacity to absorb, transmit or reflect the microwave signals. At present
most of the knowledge of the interaction of microwaves with systems has been obtained on systems with characteristic
dimensions on the order or larger than the microwaves wave length (millimetres to centimetres). For this reason, all of the
existing applications of microwave technologies exploit the properties of this interaction and these scales.
At much smaller scales (micrometers to nanometres) most of the properties remains at present still largely
unknown. Currently the fabrication of nanostructured materials either physically or in composition, and of nanoscale
objects such as nanoparticles, nanotubes and nanowires is performed routinely in many research laboratories and private
companies. In addition, the physical properties of these structures and objects (mechanical, electrical, magnetic,..) are also
relatively well understood in the two extreme frequency ranges corresponding to the low frequency range (up to 100
MHz) and to the optical frequency range (above THz). However, for the microwave frequency range 1 GHz-100 GHz
most of these properties at the nanoscale are still to be investigated.
The main reason for this situation has been the lack of a sufficient development of theoretical and experimental
techniques and tools to investigate the interaction of microwaves with matter at the nanoscale. This situation is a common
one in the history of microwave technology. Due to the comparable size (within one order of magnitude) of the
microwave wave lengths and of the components of a microwave system, the phase of the microwave signal can change
appreciably across the dimensions of the components. As a consequence specific scientific and engineering approaches
are required for microwave research and application development, which are completely distinct from the ones for the
low frequency or optical frequency applications (at lower frequencies the wave length is large enough to neglect this
phase variation while in the optical frequency range it is short enough so that geometric approximations remain valid).
According to this, all the parts of a microwave system, from the electronics to the mechanical parts, have to be designed
accurately having in mind this special property. These challenging design requirements are especially relevant in the case
of systems for nanoscale applications, since they contain physical dimensions ranging over a broad range of values (from
centimetres to nanometres). Within the research program of the network we will address these challenging issues and
overcome their limiting effect in the development of nanoscale microwave applications.