UMC Announces a Device Technique that Enhances Silicon-on-Insulator (SOI) Transistor Performance
"To further increase our competitiveness, UMC has always researched a variety of possible enabling technologies simultaneously," said S. C. Chien, senior director of UMC's Central Research and Development. "Our discovery on Direct-Tunneling induced Floating-Body Potential for Silicon-on-Insulator transistors not only provides the performance enhancement needed for UMC's future technologies, but also retains good manufacturability, which is a crucial element for a successful semiconductor foundry."
Direct Tunneling is a quantum mechanical behavior where electrons or holes jump through a thin insulator. This usually undesirable behavior can be manipulated with simple design layout structures. SOI devices could take advantage of this behavior to circumvent the Floating-Body Effect, an uncontrollable parasitic effect. With this extra control, the transistor behaves much more predictably in addition to the performance gain.
A series of publications discussing this technique have been published in the April and May editions of IEEE Electron Device Letters and IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices.
About Silicon-on-Insulator (SOI)
Silicon-on-Insulator is an approach in which transistors are built on top of an insulating material instead of the conventional silicon crystal substrate. By replacing the silicon substrate with an insulator substrate, extra capacitive load produced at the interface between the substrate and the transistor active areas is eliminated. In effect, SOI transistors can switch faster with lower power consumption, compared to conventional bulk silicon transistors. However, the body of the transistor is now sitting on an insulator and therefore electrically isolated from the rest of the circuit. The isolated body leads to the floating body effect, which creates an uncontrollable mode that makes transistors behave erratically in certain circumstances.
About UMC
UMC (NYSE: UMC, TSE: 2303) is a leading global semiconductor foundry that manufactures advanced process ICs for applications spanning every major sector of the semiconductor industry. UMC delivers cutting-edge foundry technologies that enable sophisticated system-on-chip (SOC) designs, including 90nm copper, 0.13um copper, and mixed signal/RFCMOS. UMC is also a leader in 300mm manufacturing; Fab 12A in Taiwan and Singapore-based UMCi are both in volume production for a variety of customer products. UMC employs over 9,000 people worldwide and has offices in Taiwan, Japan, Singapore, Europe, and the United States. UMC can be found on the web at http://www.umc.com.
|
Related News
- IC Knowledge's Cost Modeling of Semiconductor Manufacturing Shows Fully Depleted Silicon-on-Insulator Technology to be the Most Cost-effective Approach at the 22nm Node
- IBM Announces Industry's Densest, Fastest On-Chip Dynamic Memory in 32-Nanometer, Silicon-on-Insulator Technology
- MOSIS Marks Expanded Semiconductor Foundry Offerings With Shuttle Runs for Silicon-On-Insulator (SOI)
- ARM Announces Industry's First Silicon-on-Insulator Physical IP Library for IBM's New 45nm SOI Foundry
- Nineteen Electronics Industry Leaders Join Forces to Accelerate SOI (Silicon-On-Insulator) Innovation Into Broad Markets
Breaking News
- Attopsemi Released White Paper "I-fuse - Most Reliable and Fully Testable OTP"
- Industry R&D Spending To Rise 4% After Hitting Record in 2020
- Powerful FPGA Design Creation and Simulation IDE Adds VHDL-2019 Support & OSVVM Enhancements
- Sondrel Selects Synopsys Fusion Design and Verification Platforms to Displace Legacy Design Tools
- Dual Mode Bluetooth v5.2 SW Link Layer, Protocol Stack SW, Profiles licensed for ultra-low power 22nm True Wireless (TWS) Earbuds SoC
Most Popular
- TSMC to Kick off Mass Production of Intel CPUs in 2H21 as Intel Shifts its CPU Manufacturing Strategies, Says TrendForce
- TSMC Boosts Capital Expenditure Budget on Strong Outlook
- Gartner Says Worldwide Semiconductor Revenue Grew 7.3% in 2020
- Value of Semiconductor Industry M&A Agreements Sets Record in 2020
- Andes Technology and Rafael Microelectronics Announce a Strategic Partnership to Provide High Power Efficiency Wireless IP Solutions for IoT Devices
![]() |
E-mail This Article | ![]() |
![]() |
Printer-Friendly Page |