Transport mechanism of novel silicon-riched nitride (SRN)/ silicon-riched oxide (SRO) superlattice quantum dot structure

Novel structure of silicon-riched nitride (SRN)/silicon-riched oxide (SRO) is demonstrated using RF reactive magnetron sputtering and post-annealed, to increase the density of Si nanocrystals especially in the separated layer made of isolation medium, thus improving the transport ability of Si nanocrystal material. I-V characteristics shows the current of hybrid SRN/SRO system increases up to 2 orders of magnitude at 1V compared to that of SiN_x/Si₃N₄ structure, proving the importance of the existence of sparser Si NCs in the SRO layer to greatly improve the transport ability. Temperature dependent I-V test reveals that direct tunneling dominates at low electrical field (V<;1V) and the temperature below 180K; while at high electrical field (V>;1V) Poole-Frenkel emission is the dominated one.