As their name implies, VLSI systems involve the integration of various component systems. While all of these components systems are rooted in semiconductor manufacturing, they involve a broad range of technologies. This volume of the Principles and Applications of Engineering series examines the technologies associated with VLSI systems, including

The rapidly advancing Silicon Carbide technology has a great potential in high temperature and high frequency electronics. High thermal stability and outstanding chemical inertness make SiC an excellent material for high-power, low-loss semiconductor devices. The present volume presents the state of the art of SiC device fabrication and characterization. Topics covered include: SiC surface cleaning and etching techniques; electrical characterization methods and processing of ohmic contacts to silicon carbide; analysis of contact resistivity dependence on material properties; limitations and accuracy of contact resistivity measurements; ohmic contact fabrication and test structure design; overview of different metallization schemes and processing technologies; thermal stability of ohmic contacts to SiC, their protection and compatibility with device processing; Schottky contacts to SiC; Schottky barrier formation; Schottky barrier inhomogeneity in SiC materials; technology and design of 4H-SiC Schottky and Junction Barrier Schottky diodes; Si/SiC heterojunction diodes; applications of SiC Schottky diodes in power electronics and temperature/light sensors; high power SiC unipolar and bipolar switching devices; different types of SiC devices including material and technology constraints on device performance; applications in the area of metal contacts to silicon carbide; status and prospects of SiC power devices.

This volume addresses the burgeoning field of wide band gap materials. The 64 contributed and invited papers will do much to stimulate the well-justified ongoing work, both theoretical and experimental, in this area. The high standard of the papers attests to the significant progress that has been made in this field, as well as reporting on the challenging problems that still remain to be solved.

The primary goal of this book is to provide a sound understanding of wide bandgap Silicon Carbide (SiC) power semiconductor device simulation using Silvaco© ATLAS Technology Computer Aided Design (TCAD) software. Physics-based TCAD modeling of SiC power devices can be extremely challenging due to the wide bandgap of the semiconductor material. The material presented in this book aims to shorten the learning curve required to start successful SiC device simulation by providing a detailed explanation of simulation code and the impact of various modeling and simulation parameters on the simulation results. Non-isothermal simulation to predict heat dissipation and lattice temperature rise in a SiC device structure under switching condition has been explained in detail. Key pointers including runtime error messages, code debugging, implications of using certain models and parameter values, and other factors beneficial to device simulation are provided based on the authors' experience while simulating SiC device structures. This book is useful for students, researchers, and semiconductor professionals working in the area of SiC semiconductor technology. Readers will be provided with the source code of several fully functional simulation programs that illustrate the use of Silvaco© ATLAS to simulate SiC power device structure, as well as supplementary material for download.Related Link(s)

MEMS devices are found in many of today’s electronic devices and systems, from air-bag sensors in cars to smart phones, embedded systems, etc. Increasingly, the reduction in dimensions has led to nanometer-scale devices, called NEMS. The plethora of applications on the commercial market speaks for itself, and especially for the highly precise manufacturing of silicon-based MEMS and NEMS. While this is a tremendous achievement, silicon as a material has some drawbacks, mainly in the area of mechanical fatigue and thermal properties. Silicon carbide (SiC), a well-known wide-bandgap semiconductor whose adoption in commercial products is experiening exponential growth, especially in the power electronics arena. While SiC MEMS have been around for decades, in this Special Issue we seek to capture both an overview of the devices that have been demonstrated to date, as well as bring new technologies and progress in the MEMS processing area to the forefront. Thus, this Special Issue seeks to showcase research papers, short communications, and review articles that focus on: (1) novel designs, fabrication, control, and modeling of SiC MEMS and NEMS based on all kinds of actuation mechanisms; and (2) new developments in applying SiC MEMS and NEMS in consumer electronics, optical communications, industry, medicine, agriculture, space, and defense.

This book reviews the progress achieved in SiC research and development, particularly over the past 10 years. It presents the essential properties of 3C-, 6H- and 4H-SiC polytypes including structural, electrical, optical, surface and interface properties; describes existing key SiC devices and also the challenges in materials growth and device fabrication of the 21st century.