AlGaN/GaN high-electron mobility transistor's (HEMT's) off-state breakdown is investigated using drain-current injection techniques with different injection current levels. Competitions between the source leakage and gate leakage, pure leakage and impact ionization, and source-and gate-injection-induced impact ionization during the drain-injection measurement are discussed in detail. It was found that the breakdown originates from the source/gate leakage at low drain injection levels but is dominated by source/gate-induced impact ionization process at high drain injection currents. The source-induced impact ionization usually precedes the gate-induced impact ionization in low-gate leakage devices, resulting in a premature three-terminal off-state breakdown. We also found that the gate-bias value affects the breakdown voltage in the conventional three-terminal off-state breakdown I-V measurement and should be carefully considered.

Modulations of energy band and polarization field by fluorine ions in fluorine plasma treated AlGaN/GaN heterostructures were revealed by positron annihilation spectroscopy (PAS). It is found that the annihilation probability is mainly governed by the electric field in the AlGaN/GaN heterostructure, which could be modulated by charged ions, opposite to what was first expected from the large number of plasma-induced defects such as Ga-vacancies. The modulation of electric field is successfully observed through the opposite changes in the S parameters on the two sides of the hetero-interface after fluorine plasma treatment due to the opposite E-field directions. Fluorine is experimentally proved to be negatively charged in GaN related materials, which is consistent with the operation principle of enhancement-mode AlGaN/GaN HEMT fabricated by fluorine plasma treatment. It is also suggested that PAS is a useful tool to probe the intrinsic electric field in AlGaN/GaN system. (C) 2010 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim