A highly manufacturable technology for radiation-hardened and high-temperature system applications

This SBIR Phase I project is proposed to develop a highly manufacturable technology for radiation-hardened high-temperature SiC devices for both military and commercial applications. The innovative design in device structure and in processing of the proposed SiC power device will make it possible to offer the ultimate high radiation tolerance. The SiC device will also overcome the bottleneck problems of low inversion layer carrier mobility and low gate oxide reliability problems of SiC power MOSFETs under high temperature. In Phase I, efforts are proposed to develop the manufacturing technology through experimental demonstration of the proposed SiC device. Commercially available SiC wafers will be used to demonstrate the devices with aggressive voltage and current targets. Computer modeling will be done to extract key parameters to guide efforts for further device improvements. Preliminary radiation and high-temperature study will also be performed to investigate the radiation and high-temperature effects on the SiC device performance. The fabricated SiC devices will be delivered for system prototyping for rad-hard and high temperature applications. In Phase II, the rad-hard manufacturing technology will be fully developed and SiC devices with substantially increased power level will be delivered for insertion into MDA systems and subsystems.