Mitigation of self-heating in AlGaN/GaN HEMTs using transferred LPCVD-grown h-BN
Abstract
With the increasing power density of GaN-based power devices, the self-heating effect has become a significant bottleneck, impacting device reliability and performance, which makes effective thermal management essential. Hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN), with its high thermal conductivity and excellent electrical insulation, offers a promising solution for heat dissipation. In this Letter, we demonstrate that the transferred low-pressure chemical vapor deposition-grown h-BN effectively mitigates self-heating in AlGaN/gallium nitride high electron mobility transistors. All 12 tested devices showed increased current after BN transfer. The average current density in the saturation region improved from 819 to 924 mA/mm, and the current retention rose from 89% to 98%. Thermo-reflectance measurements revealed a significant reduction in channel temperature from 179 to 115 °C under a power density of 21 W/mm. The improvement is attributed to the high in-plane thermal conductivity of h-BN, which is proven by the hotspot models. This approach shows promise as a practical method to reduce self-heating and enhance the thermal reliability of GaN-based power transistors.
Article Details
Journal Info
Applied Physics Letters
American Institute of Physics
Authors (16)
Cheng Chang
Kad Dokwan Kook
George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology 2 , Atlanta, Georgia 30332,
Chenyang Lin
Department of Materials Science and Nanoengineering, Rice University 2 , Houston, Texas 77005,
Xiang Zhang
Yuetong Yang
State Key Laboratory of Molecular Engineering of Polymers, Department of Macromolecular Science
Shisong Luo
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Rice University 1 , Houston, Texas 77005,
Ziyi He
Department of Cardiology, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Tianjin University of Chinese Medicine, Tianjin, China (Z.H.).
Tao Li
Mingfei Xu
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Rice University 1 , Houston, Texas 77005,
Lucas Lau
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Rice University 1 , Houston, Texas 77005,
Md Jahidul Hoq Emon
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Rice University 1 , Houston, Texas 77005,
Rummanur Rahad
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Rice University 1 , Houston, Texas 77005,
Pulickel Ajayan
Department of Materials Science and Nanoengineering, Rice University 3 , Houston, Texas 77005
Jun Lou
Satish Kumar
Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science
Yuji Zhao
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Rice University 1 , Houston, Texas 77005,