Digital and analog TFET circuits: Design and benchmark

Solid-State Electronics
Volume 146, August 2018, Pages 50–65
Invited Review

S. Strangio^a,b, F. Settino^a,b, P. Palestri^a, M. Lanuzza^b, F. Crupi^b, D. Esseni^a, L. Selmi^a,c

^aDPIA, Università degli Studi di Udine, Via delle Scienze 206, I-33100 Udine, UD, Italy
^bDIMES, Università della Calabria, Via P. Bucci, 41C, I-87036 Arcavacata di Rende (CS), Italy
^cDipartimento di Ingegneria “Enzo Ferrari”, Università degli Studi di Modena e Reggio Emilia, I-41100 Modena, Italy

ARTICLE INFO: The review of this paper was arranged by Prof. S. Cristoloveanu
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sse.2018.05.003

HIGHLIGHTS:

• We report simulations of basic analog and digital circuit blocks employing tunnel-FETs.
• Template III-V heterojunction tunnel-FETs are benchmarked against silicon FinFETs for the 10 nm node.
• Performance are evaluated down to VDD = 200 mV.
• Tunnel-FETs result advantageous with respect to silicon FinFET for VDD below approximately 400 mV.

ABSTRACT: In this work, we investigate by means of simulations the performance of basic digital, analog, and mixed-signal circuits employing tunnel-FETs (TFETs). The analysis reviews and complements our previous papers on these topics. By considering the same devices for all the analysis, we are able to draw consistent conclusions for a wide variety of circuits. A virtual complementary TFET technology consisting of III-V heterojunction nanowires is considered. Technology Computer Aided Design (TCAD) models are calibrated against the results of advanced full-quantum simulation tools and then used to generate look-up-tables suited for circuit simulations. The virtual complementary TFET technology is benchmarked against predictive technology models (PTM) of complementary silicon FinFETs for the 10nm node over a wide range of supply voltages (VDD) in the sub-threshold voltage domain considering the same footprint between the vertical TFETs and the lateral FinFETs and the same static power. In spite of the asymmetry between p- and n-type transistors, the results show clear advantages of TFET technology over FinFET for VDD lower than 0.4V. Moreover, we highlight how differences in the I-V characteristics of FinFETs and TFETs suggest to adapt the circuit topologies used to implement basic digital and analog blocks with respect to the most common CMOS solutions.

FIG: Sketch of n- and p-type TFET and FinFET device architectures. The red and blue colors indicate the n- and p-doping types, respectively (green: intrinsic semiconductor, transparent-grey: oxide). TFET dimensions are: LG=20nm, nanowire cross section (LS)=7nm, EOT=1nm. FinFET dimensions are: LG=14nm, tfin=8nm, hfin=21nm, EOT=0.88nm. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)