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Reconfigurable frequency multiplication with a ferroelectric transistor

Nature Electronics volume 3, pages 391–397 (2020)Cite this article

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Abstract

Frequency multiplication is essential in wireless communication systems, where stable high-frequency oscillations are required. However, multipliers typically employ power- and area-hungry filtering and amplification circuits. Here, we show that a single ferroelectric field-effect transistor, made from ferroelectric hafnium oxide, can be used as a full-wave rectifier and frequency doubler. This is achieved by using the parabolic shape of the transistor’s transfer characteristics, which can be tailored by accurately tuning the partial polarization switching and the band-to-band tunnelling drain current. Due to the reversible polarization switching, our approach is fully reconfigurable, allowing either multiplication or simple transmission of the input frequency to be activated within a single ferroelectric transistor. With our devices, we also implement two practical cases of the frequency modulation scheme without any additional filtering circuits.

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Fig. 1: Partial polarization switching in FeFETs.
Fig. 2: Arbitrary tuning of the shape and symmetry of the FeFET transfer characteristics.
Fig. 3: Frequency doubling with a FeFET.
Fig. 4: Reliability of FeFET-based frequency multiplication.
Fig. 5: Experimental implementation of binary FSK.
Fig. 6: Binary FSK by PRG/ERS operations.

Data availability

The data that support the plots within this paper and other findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

We thank S. Dünkel, S. Beyer, M. Trentzsch and other colleagues from GLOBALFOUNDRIES Fab1 LLC & Co. KG, Dresden for sample fabrication, support and discussions. We also acknowledge V. Havel from NaMLab gGmbH for useful suggestions regarding the measurement set-up. This work was supported financially by the European Fund for Regional Development (EFRD), Europe Supports Saxony and by funds released by the delegates of the Saxon State Parliament.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. NaMLab gGmbH, Dresden, Germany

    Halid Mulaosmanovic, Evelyn T. Breyer, Thomas Mikolajick & Stefan Slesazeck

  2. Chair of Nanoelectronic Materials, TU Dresden, Dresden, Germany

    Thomas Mikolajick

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  1. Halid Mulaosmanovic
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  2. Evelyn T. Breyer
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  3. Thomas Mikolajick
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Contributions

H.M. conceived, designed and performed the experiments, analysed the data and wrote the manuscript. All authors contributed to discussing the data and revising the manuscript. All authors have given approval to the final version of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Halid Mulaosmanovic.

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Mulaosmanovic, H., Breyer, E.T., Mikolajick, T. et al. Reconfigurable frequency multiplication with a ferroelectric transistor. Nat Electron 3, 391–397 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41928-020-0413-0

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