A Novel GaN-Hemt based Inverter and Cascode Amplifier

Design and analysis of a novel Enhancement-mode 120nm Ti-gate GaN based High Electron Mobility Transistor (HEMT) has been presented and its behavior in typical real-world circuits has been explored. The DC characteristics of the device reveal an on-state current density of 26.4A/mm, simultaneously achieving a sub-threshold swing of 70mV/decade. The simulated results show a peak transconductance of 15700mS/mm. The proposed device has been used to design a resistive load inverter and its characteristics have been extensively studied. The voltage transfer characteristics (VTC) display a maximum noise margin (NM
_H
and NM
_L
) of 2.16V and O.76V respectively at a supply voltage of 5V. The transient response of the inverter for a pulsed DC input voltage exhibits a negligible propagation delay of 6ps and very high switching speed. The effect of the supply voltage and Al molar fraction in the barrier layer of the HEMT on the inverter characteristics has been further analyzed. The authors have also successfully investigated the behavior of a cascode amplifier developed using the novel GaN-HEMT.