title: Towards quantitative electrostatic potential mapping of working semiconductor devices using off-axis electron holography.
abstract: Pronounced improvements in the understanding of semiconductor device performance are expected if electrostatic potential distributions can be measured quantitatively and reliably under working conditions with sufficient sensitivity and spatial resolution. Here, we employ off-axis electron holography to characterize an electrically-biased Si p-n junction by measuring its electrostatic potential, electric field and charge density distributions under working conditions. A comparison between experimental electron holographic phase images and images obtained using three-dimensional electrostatic potential simulations highlights several remaining challenges to quantitative analysis. Our results illustrate how the determination of reliable potential distributions from phase images of electrically biased devices requires electrostatic fringing fields, surface charges, specimen preparation damage and the effects of limited spatial resolution to be taken into account.
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials, Imperial College London, London SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom; Center for Electron Nanoscopy, Technical University of Denmark, DK 2800 Lyngby, Denmark. Electronic address: sadegh.yazdi@cen.dtu.dk.
authors.forename: Sadegh
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Yazdi
authors.affiliation: Center for Electron Nanoscopy, Technical University of Denmark, DK 2800 Lyngby, Denmark.
authors.forename: Takeshi
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kasama
authors.affiliation: Center for Electron Nanoscopy, Technical University of Denmark, DK 2800 Lyngby, Denmark.
authors.forename: Marco
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Beleggia
authors.affiliation: Center for Electron Nanoscopy, Technical University of Denmark, DK 2800 Lyngby, Denmark.
authors.forename: Maryam
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Samaie Yekta
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials, Imperial College London, London SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom; Department of Materials Science and Engineering, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH 43210, United States.
authors.forename: David W
authors.initials: DW
authors.lastname: McComb
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials, Imperial College London, London SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Alison C
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Twitchett-Harrison
authors.affiliation: Center for Electron Nanoscopy, Technical University of Denmark, DK 2800 Lyngby, Denmark; Ernst Ruska-Centre for Microscopy and Spectroscopy with Electrons and Peter Grünberg Institute, Forschungszentrum Jülich, D-52425 Jülich, Germany.
authors.forename: Rafal E
authors.initials: RE
authors.lastname: Dunin-Borkowski
keywords: Doping; In-situ biasing; Off-axis electron holography; pn junction