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Radiation-hardened and repairable integrated circuits based on carbon nanotube transistors with ion gel gates

Nature Electronics volume 3, pages 622–629 (2020)Cite this article

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Abstract

Electronics devices that operate in outer space and nuclear reactors require radiation-hardened transistors. However, high-energy radiation can damage the channel, gate oxide and substrate of a field-effect transistor (FET), and redesigning all vulnerable parts to make them more resistant to total ionizing dose irradiation has proved challenging. Here, we report a radiation-hardened FET that uses semiconducting carbon nanotubes as the channel material, an ion gel as the gate and polyimide as the substrate. The FETs exhibit a radiation tolerance of up to 15 Mrad at a dose rate of 66.7 rad s−1, which is notably higher than the tolerance of silicon-based transistors (1 Mrad). The devices can also be used to make complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS)-like inverters with similarly high tolerances. Furthermore, we show that radiation-damaged FETs can be recovered by annealing at a moderate temperature of 100 °C for 10 min.

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Fig. 1: The radiation-immune FET.
Fig. 2: TID-dependent property evolution of ion gel CNT FETs and CMOS-like inverters fabricated on Si substrates.
Fig. 3: TID-dependent property evolution of ion gel CNT FETs and CMOS-like inverters fabricated on polyimide substrates.
Fig. 4: Radiation damage repairing of ion gel CNT FETs and CMOS-like inverters via annealing at moderate temperature.

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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

This work was supported by the National Key Research & Development Program (grants 2016YFA0201901 and 2016YFB0401100) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant nos. 6188102 and 61874132).

Author information

Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Maguang Zhu, Hongshan Xiao.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory for the Physics and Chemistry of Nanodevices and Center for Carbon-based Electronics, Department of Electronics, Peking University, Beijing, China

    Maguang Zhu, Hongshan Xiao, Pengkun Sun, Zhiyong Zhang & Lian-Mao Peng

  2. Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Peking University, Beijing, China

    Maguang Zhu & Lian-Mao Peng

  3. Printable Electronics Research Centre, Suzhou Institute of Nanotech and Nano-bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, People’s Republic of China

    Hongshan Xiao, Zheng Cui & Jianwen Zhao

  4. School of Physical Science and Technology, Shanghai Tech University, Shanghai, People’s Republic of China

    Hongshan Xiao

  5. Institute of Microelectronics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

    Gangping Yan & Jianhua Jiang

  6. Frontiers Science Center for Nano-optoelectronics, Peking University, Beijing, China

    Zhiyong Zhang & Lian-Mao Peng

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  1. Maguang Zhu
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Contributions

Z.Z. proposed and supervised the project. Z.Z., L.-M.P. and J.Z. designed the experiment. M.Z. and H.X. performed all of the device/circuit fabrication and performance characterization. M.Z. and P.S. performed the TID characterization. G.Y. and J.J. performed the TID simulation using TCAD. M.Z., H.X., Z.C., Z.Z., J.Z. and L.-M.P. analysed the data and co-wrote the manuscript. All the authors discussed the results and commented on the manuscript.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Jianwen Zhao, Zhiyong Zhang or Lian-Mao Peng.

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Zhu, M., Xiao, H., Yan, G. et al. Radiation-hardened and repairable integrated circuits based on carbon nanotube transistors with ion gel gates. Nat Electron 3, 622–629 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41928-020-0465-1

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