Enhanced reliability of electroluminescence from metal–oxide–silicon tunneling diodes by deuterium incorporation

The reliability of electroluminescence from metal–oxide–silicon ~MOS! tunneling diodes was improved by the incorporation of deuterium. The deuterium was incorporated by the deuterium prebake and the postoxide deuterium annealing. At constant current stress of 100 mA, a deuterium-treated n-channel MOS tunneling light-emitting diode shows that the integrated light emission intensity increases slightly about 6% after 10 000 s operation, while the hydrogen-treated device shows a 30% decrease of the integrated light emission intensity. The hydrogen release by the electrons tunneling from the gate electrode to Si and the formation of interface defects are responsible for the degradation of light output in the hydrogen-treated samples. An annealing model is also given to explain the slight increase of light output in the deuterium-treated samples. © 2001 American Institute of Physics. @DOI: 10.1063/1.1353817#