Charge Pumping and Flicker Noise-based Defect Characterization in Ferroelectric FETs

Hafnium based ferroelectric field effect transistors (FeFETs) are expected to be influenced by a high defect density of thick gate ferroelectric hafnium oxide. In order to quantity this noise source, we optimized noise and defect density investigation methods with respect to stable erase and program states of FeFETs. Understanding defect states and lowering defect density as well as noise level is of high interest for the application as non-volatile memory. Charge pumping and Flicker noise characterization techniques were applied to the ferroelectric stable states, demonstrating the possibility to investigate the defect density and Flicker noise level of a ferroelectric transistor system in relation to variability and reliability.