Non-vertical sidewall angle influence on triple-gate FinFETs corner effects

Abstract

Some fabricated FinFET devices present width variations along the vertical direction due to fabrication process limitations. These variations lead to non-rectangular cross-section shapes. One of the most frequent shapes is the trapezoidal (plane and inclined sidewalls). Another identified phenomenon in multiple-gate devices such as FinFETs is the corner effect, which occurs due to the overlapping of the influences of two gate planes near the device corners. This paper addresses the variation of the corner effect as a function of the sidewall inclination angle, through 3-D numeric simulation. A set of devices of several inclination angles and body doping levels were simulated. The corner effect depends on the inclination angle, specially for higher doping levels. © The Electrochemical Society.