Monte-Carlo investigation of in-plane electron transport in tensile strained Si and Si_1−yC_y (y ≤ 0.03)

Institut d'Électronique Fondamentale (URA 22 du CNRS), Université Paris-Sud, Bâtiment 220, 91405 Orsay Cedex, France

Corresponding author: philippe.dollfus@ief.u-psud.fr

Received: 14 January 1999
Accepted: 15 April 1999
Published online: 15 July 1999

Abstract

Electron transport properties in tensile strained Si-based materials are theoretically analyzed using Monte-Carlo calculation. We focus our interest on in-plane transport in Si and Si_1−yC_y (y ≤ 0.03), grown respectively on 〈001〉 Si_1−xGe_x pseudo-substrate and Si substrate, with a view to Field-Effect-Transistor application. In comparison with unstrained Si, the tensile strain effect is shown to be very attractive in Si: drift mobilities greater than 3000 cm²/Vs are obtained at 300 K for a Ge fraction mole of 0.2 in the pseudo-substrate. In the Si_1−yC_y/Si system, that does not need any pseudo-substrate, the beneficial strain effect on transport is counterbalanced by the alloy scattering whose influence on mobility is studied. If the alloy potential is greater than about 1 eV, the advantage of strain-induced reduction of effective mass is lost in terms of stationary transport performance at 300 K.