Temperature dependence of SiC thin film metal-insulator-metal (MIM) capacitors on alumina over a temperature range from 25 to 500ºC

In this paper, we present the design, fabrication and characterization of thin film, silicon carbide (SiC) metal-insulator-metal capacitors over a temperature range of 25 to 500°C. The 600 nm thick silicon carbide insulating film was grown with a plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition unit at 300 and 450°C. Two bottom electrode metal alloys were investigated to determine their effects at higher temperatures on the capacitor reliability. Five capacitor geometries with areas of 0.029, 0.144, 0.292, 0.436 and 0.593 mm
²
were measured on a high temperature probe station over a frequency range from 10 MHz to 10 GHz. The S-parameters were measured on a vector network analyzer and the lumped circuit model was extracted using Agilent's Advanced Design System™ software suite. The dielectric constant was extracted from the measured capacitance values. A C-V meter was also used to determine the capacitance and conductance.