Low-resistance, high-yield electrical contacts to atom scale Si:P devices using palladium silicide

Published

March 29, 2019

Author(s)

Scott W. Schmucker, Pradeep Namboodiri, Ranjit Kashid, Xiqiao Wang, Binhui Hu, Jonathan Wyrick, Alline Myers, Joshua D. Schumacher, Richard M. Silver, Michael Stewart

Abstract

Scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) enables the fabrication of 2-D delta-doped structures in Si with atomistic precision, with applications from tunnel field effect transistors to qubits. The combination of a very small contact area and the restrictive thermal budget necessary to maintain the integrity of the delta layer make developing a robust electrical contact method a significant challenge to realizing the potential of atomically precise devices. Here, we demonstrate a method for electrical contact using Pd2Si formed at the temperature of silicon overgrowth (250°C) minimizing the diffusive impact on the delta layer. We use the transfer length method to show our Pd2Si contacts have very high yield (>98.2%) and low-resistance (272±41 Ω-μm) in contacting mesa-etched blanket delta layers. We also present three terminal measurements of low contact resistance (<1 kΩ) to devices written by STM hydrogen depassivation lithography with similarly high yield (>96.8%).

Citation

Physical Review Applied

Volume

11

Issue

3

Pub Type

Journals

Download Paper

https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevApplied.11.034071

Local Download

Keywords

STM, qubit, ohmic contact, phosphorus monolayer

Citation

Schmucker, S. , Namboodiri, P. , Kashid, R. , Wang, X. , Hu, B. , Wyrick, J. , Myers, A. , Schumacher, J. , Silver, R. and Stewart, M. (2019), Low-resistance, high-yield electrical contacts to atom scale Si:P devices using palladium silicide, Physical Review Applied, [online], https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevApplied.11.034071, https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=926446 (Accessed October 10, 2025)