Thermionic Emission as a Tool to Study Transport in Undoped nFinFETs

Thermally activated subthreshold transport has been investigated in undoped triple-gate MOSFETs. The evolution of the barrier height and of the active cross-sectional area of the channel as a function of gate voltage has been determined. The results of our experiments and of the tight-binding simulations we have developed are both in good agreement with previous analytical calculations, confirming the validity of the thermionic approach to investigate transport in FETs. This method provides an important tool for the improvement of device characteristics.