Novel nitrogen profile engineering for improved TaN/HfO/sub 2//Si MOSFET performance

A novel technique to tailor the nitrogen profile in HfO/sub 2/ gate dielectric has been developed. Nitrogen was incorporated in the upper layer of HfO/sub 2/ using a reactive sputtering method, followed by a reoxidation anneal. The resulting dielectrics showed good thermal stability, boron penetration suppression, low interfacial trap density, plus lower hysteresis and improved MOSFET characteristics, in comparison to both non-nitrided and bottom nitrided (via Si-surface nitridation with NH/sub 3/) devices.