Single and Triple Insulator Metal-Insulator-Metal Diodes for Infrared Rectennas

Tekin, Serdar, Das, P, Weerakkody, AD, Sedghi, Naser ORCID: 0000-0002-2004-6159, Hall, S ORCID: 0000-0001-8387-1036, Mitrovic, IZ ORCID: 0000-0003-4816-8905, Werner, M, Wrench, JS and Chalker, PR ORCID: 0000-0002-2295-6332 (2021) Single and Triple Insulator Metal-Insulator-Metal Diodes for Infrared Rectennas. Solid-State Electronics, 185. p. 108096.

Text Tekin et al. SSE-2nd revised final-clean copy.docx - Author Accepted Manuscript Download (3MB)

Abstract

Tunnel-barrier rectifiers comprising single and triple insulator configurations have been fabricated by atomic layer deposition (ALD) to investigate the insulator (Al2O3, Ta2O5, Nb2O5) layer quality and rectification performance for inclusion in rectenna arrays for infrared energy harvesting. ALD has provided superior control of nanometer film thickness (1–3 nm) as well as insulator film quality as tunneling has been found to be the dominant conduction mechanism for all fabricated devices. The key rectifier properties, such as asymmetry, non-linearity, responsivity and dynamic resistance have been assessed from current-voltage (I-V) measurements. The Au/Al2O3/Ti diode exhibits zero bias responsivity of −0.6 A/W, showing that it can be used for energy harvesting applications without the aid of external bias. The effect of resonant tunneling on rectification performance of triple insulator non-cascaded (Ta2O5/Nb2O5/Al2O3) and cascaded (Nb2O5/Ta2O5/Al2O3) rectifiers has been observed from experimental I-V characteristics and substantiated by theoretical simulations. Superior low-voltage asymmetry (6 at 0.1 V) and responsivity (4.3 A/W at 0.35 V) for triple insulator MI3M rectifiers have been observed. The resonant tunneling does not provide enhanced rectification at low bias as previously reported, rather it has much smaller effect. The latter indicates that dissimilar metal electrodes rectifier configurations are more promising for inclusion in optical rectenna.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	MIM, Rectenna, Rectification, Tunneling, ALD, Dielectrics
Divisions:	Faculty of Science and Engineering > School of Electrical Engineering, Electronics and Computer Science Faculty of Science and Engineering > School of Engineering
Depositing User:	Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited:	01 Jun 2021 14:19
Last Modified:	18 Jan 2023 22:37
DOI:	10.1016/j.sse.2021.108096
Related URLs:	Author Publisher
URI:	https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3124758