Thermal and Performance Modeling of Nanoscale Mosfets , Carbon Nanotube Devices and Integrated Circuits

Title of dissertation: THERMAL AND PERFORMANCE MODELING OF NANOSCALE MOSFETS, CARBON NANOTUBE DEVICES AND INTEGRATED CIRCUITS Akin Akturk, Doctor of Philosophy, 2006 Dissertation directed by: Professor Neil Goldsman Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering We offer new paradigms for electronic devices and digital integrated circuits (ICs) in an effort to overcome important performance threatening problems such as self heating. To investigate chip heating, we report novel methods for predicting the thermal profiles of complex ICs at the resolution of a single device. We resolve device and IC temperatures self-consistently, with individual device performances, while accounting for IC layout and software application details. At the device level, we calculate performance and generated heat details. We then extend these performance figures to the overall chip using a stochastic or Monte Carlo type methodology. Next, at the IC level, we solve for the device temperatures using the chip’s layout and application software details. Here, we apply our mixed-mode algorithm to two-dimensional (planar) and three-dimensional ICs. To relieve thermal stresses and performance degradation in specific areas of extreme heating or hot spots, we offer design strategies using thermal contacts or different IC layouts. Moreover, we also show chips that we had designed and fabricated through IC fabrication clearing house MOSIS for experimental investigations. We also investigate carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and CNT embedded MOSFETs as new device paradigms for future electronic circuits. To examine the effects of CNTs on device performance, we develop a CNT Monte Carlo simulator, and determine scattering rates and CNT electron transport. Here, we report positiondependent velocity oscillations and length effects in semiconducting single-walled zig-zag carbon nanotubes. Our calculated results indicate velocity oscillations in the Terahertz range, which approaches phonon frequencies. This may facilitate new high frequency RF device and circuit designs, opening new paradigms in communication networks. Furthermore, to obtain device performance figures for MOSFETs that embed CNTs in their channels, our device solver determines interactions between the CNT and silicon (Si) by obtaining quantization and transport effects on the tube and the Si, and at the CNT-Si barrier. We predict that the CNT-MOSFET yields a better performance than the traditional MOSFET. Especially, CNT-MOSFETs employing lower diameter tubes exhibit improved performance capabilities. We also perform similar analyses for CNT embedded SOI-MOSFETs. THERMAL AND PERFORMANCE MODELING OF NANOSCALE MOSFETS, CARBON NANOTUBE DEVICES AND INTEGRATED CIRCUITS