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Published on: July 24, 2015
Strong Fermi-Level Pinning at Metal/n-Si(001) Interface Ensured by Forming an Intact Schottky Contact with a Graphene
Hoon Hahn Yoon, Sungchul Jung, Gahyun Choi
1Department of Physics and Energy Harvest-Storage Reseach Center (EHSRC), University of Ulsan , Ulsan 44610, Republic of Korea.
Abstract:
We report the systematic experimental studies demonstrating that a graphene layer inserted at metal/n-Si(001) interface is efficient to explore interface Fermi-level pinning effect. It is confirmed that an inserted graphene layer prevents atomic interdiffusion to form an atomically abrupt Schottky contact. The Schottky barriers of metal/graphene/n-Si(001) junctions show a very weak dependence on metal work-function, implying that the metal Fermi-level is almost completely pinned at charge neutrality level close to the valence band edge of Si. The atomically impermeable and electronically transparent properties of graphene can be used generally to form an intact Schottky contact for all semiconductors.
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