Experimental Demonstration of p-Channel Germanium Epitaxial Tunnel Layer (ETL) Tunnel FET With High Tunneling Current and High ON/OFF Ratio

A CMOS process compatible p-channel tunnel field-effect transistor (TFET) with an epitaxial tunnel layer (ETL) structure is demonstrated experimentally. The fabricated ETL p-TFET exhibits high tunneling current (I
_ON
~ 0.17 μA/μm at |V
_G
| = 0.5 V after V
_TH
adjustment), ultra-low OFF-state current, and good average subthreshold swing (S.S. ~100 mV/ decade up to 10 nA/μm). Overall performance exceeds that of the current state-of-the-art Ge-based planar p-TFETs.