Breakdown enhancement of diamond Schottky barrier diodes using boron implanted edge terminations.

Abstract Boron implanted edge terminations have been demonstrated to enhance the breakdown voltages and stabilities of diamond Schottky barrier diodes (SBDs). The edge terminations were achieved by boron implant to form nonconductive amorphous regions under the edges of the Schottky contacts. Direct current measurements show the implanted regions did not contribute to the forward currents and high current densities of about 4000 A/cm2 were obtained at −5 V. By using boron implanted edge terminations, although an increase in leakage currents was observed, the average breakdown voltage of the devices was significantly improved from 79 V to 125 V, which is increased by more than 50%. In addition, the breakdown voltages of the devices without edge terminations degraded quickly after each repeating measurement, whereas the devices with edge terminations became much more stable and no obvious drop in breakdown voltages was observed. Graphical abstract Unlabelled Image Highlights • Boron implant was studied to terminate the diamond SBDs. • Boron implanted regions became nonconductive and did not contribute to the forward currents of the diamond SBDs. • Boron implanted edge terminations significantly improved the breakdown voltages of the diamond SBDs. • The stabilities of the diamond SBDs were dramatically improved by using boron implanted edge terminations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]