Experimental characterization and modeling of most advanced Silicon-Germanium HBT technologies from 4 K to 423 K

硅-锗-碳(SiGEC)异质结双极晶体管(HBT)的最新技术发展使得即使在工业原型工艺中，最高工作频率也达到了500 GHz或更高，击穿电压(BVCEO)为1.6V。BiCMOS技术将高速HBT电路与中等成本的数字CMOS相结合，使各种商业和新兴的毫米波和亚毫米波应用成为可能，如宽带无线通信、成像和传感。Sigec HBT也越来越多地进入在极端条件下工作的偏置和温度方面的应用中。在空间、材料物理、化学和技术发展方面的许多探索都得益于在低温下操作电子电路和设备。特别是，Sigec HBT已被证明在4K下工作，性能显著提高，这使它们在量子计算等新兴应用中具有吸引力，在量子计算中，可以用速度来换取更低的噪声和能效。遗憾的是，目前还不存在用于设计低温高频(HF)电路的模型。在该项目的第一阶段，通过实验证明了现有HBT紧凑型模型在150K至423K温度范围内的适用性，第一批低温测量显示模型在4K至150K范围内存在严重的模型缺陷，因此该项目第二阶段的主要目标既解决了这些不足，也解决了新兴低温应用对精确模型的日益增长的需求：(1)针对Sigec HBT的几何可伸缩非线性紧凑模型的理论开发和模拟器实施，该模型能够准确地捕捉在4K至150K低温(包括低温)下的工作，并特别侧重于极低功率毫米波应用的饱和区。(2)设计和制造用于确定模型参数的HBT和无源器件(与毫米波电路有关)的测试芯片，以及用于低温应用和模型验证的选定电路积木。(3)在4K至150K的温度范围内，对采用不同先进工艺技术的高速高压Sigec异质结双极晶体管进行了直流和高频特性的实验研究，包括偏置、频率和几何形状，以进行紧凑模型验证和参数提取。该项目的成果使毫米波和亚毫米波电路和系统设计适用于在低温，特别是低温下运行的新兴应用。开发的模型将被谷歌和麻省理工学院等IHP客户用于设计量子计算电路。

Recent technology development of silicon-germanium-carbon (SiGeC) heterojunction bipolar transistors (HBTs) has led to maximum operating frequencies of 500 GHz and beyond at 1.6 V breakdown voltage (BVCEO) even for industry prototyping processes. BiCMOS technology, resulting from combining high-speed HBT circuits with moderate-cost digital CMOS, has enabled a large variety of commercial and emerging mm- and sub-mm-wave applications, such as broadband wireless communications, imaging and sensing. SiGeC HBTs have increasingly also found their way into applications operating under extreme conditions in terms of bias and temperatures. Many explorations in space, material physics, chemistry, and technology development benefit from operating electronic circuits and devices at cryogenic temperatures. In particular, SiGeC HBTs have been shown to operate at 4 K with significantly improved performance which has made them attractive for emerging applications such as quantum computing, where speed can be traded for lower noise and energy efficiency. Unfortunately, models for the design of cryogenic high-frequency (HF) circuits do presently not exist. In the first phase of this project the suitability of the existing HBT compact model was experimentally demonstrated for the temperature range of 150 K to 423 K, and first low-temperature measurements revealed serious model deficiencies in the range of 4 K to 150 K. The main objectives of this second phase of the project thus address both these deficiencies and the increasing need for accurate models for emerging low-temperature applications: (1) Theory development for and simulator implementation of a physics-based geometry scalable non-linear compact model for SiGeC HBTs that accurately captures the operation at low (including cryogenic) temperatures from 4 K to 150 K with special emphasis on the saturation region for extremely low-power mm-wave applications. (2) Design and fabrication of test chips with HBTs and passive devices (relevant to mm-wave circuits) for model parameter determination as well as with selected circuit building blocks for cryogenic applications and model verification. (3) Experimental DC and HF characterization of high-speed and high-voltage SiGeC HBTs, fabricated with different advanced process technologies, versus bias, frequency, and geometry in the temperature range of 4 K to 150 K for compact model verification and parameter extraction. The results of this project enable mm- and sub-mm-wave circuit and system design for emerging applications operating at low and, in particular, cryogenic temperatures. The developed model will be used, among others, by IHP customers, such as Google and MIT, for designing circuits for quantum computing.