Tunneling leakage current in ultrathin (<4 nm) nitride/oxide stack dielectrics

The leakage current in high-quality ultrathin silicon nitride/oxide (N/O) stack dielectric is calculated based on a model of one-step electron tunneling through both the nitride and the oxide layers. The results show that the tunneling leakage current in the N/O stack is substantially lower than that in the oxide layer of the same equivalent oxide thickness (EOT). The theoretical leakage current in N/O stack has been found to be a strong function of the nitride/oxide EOT ratio: in the direct tunneling regime, the leakage current decreases monotonically as the M/O ratio increases, while in the Fowler-Nordheim regime the lowest leakage current is realized with a N/O EOT ratio of 1:1. Due to the asymmetry of the N/O barrier shape, the leakage current under substrate injection is higher than that under gate injection, although such a difference becomes smaller in the lower voltage regime. Experimental data obtained from high quality ultrathin N/O stack dielectrics agree well with calculated results.