A simulation study of graphene-nanoribbon tunneling FET with heterojunction channel

Abstract

The device physics and performance of heterojunction (HJ) graphene-nanoribbon (GNR) tunneling field-effect transistors (TFETs) with different designs are investigated in this letter. Due to the width-dependent energy bandgap EG, a single GNR with spatially dependent width naturally yields an HJ structure to improve the device performance of a GNR TFET. By adding a small-EG region in the channel near the source and a large-EG region in the middle of the channel, the on-and off-state currents (ION and IOFF, respectively) can be tuned. Last, we have studied the effect of channel length scaling on an HJ GNR TFET, and it has been observed that an ION/IOFF ratio of four orders of magnitude can be achieved with a channel length of 10 nm and a drain bias of 0.6 V. © 2006 IEEE.