Toward high-current-density and high-frequency graphene resonant tunneling transistors

作者：Zihao Zhang, Baoqing Zhang, Yifei Zhang, Yiming Wang, Patrick Hays, Sefaattin Tongay, Mingyang Wang, Hecheng Han, Hu Li, Jiawei Zhang, Aimin Song · 发表于：Nature Communications · 年份：2025 · DOI：10.1038/s41467-025-58720-7 · 被引用次数：13 · 研究领域：Graphene research and applications、Quantum and electron transport phenomena、Advancements in Semiconductor Devices and Circuit Design

Abstract Negative differential resistance (NDR), a peculiar electrical property in which current decreases with increasing voltage, is highly desirable for multivalued logic gates, memory devices, and oscillators. Recently, 2D quantum-tunneling NDR devices have attracted considerable attention because of the inherent atomically flat and dangling-bond-free surfaces of 2D materials. However, the low current density of 2D NDR devices limits their operating frequency to less than 2 MHz. In this study, graphene/hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN)/graphene resonant tunneling transistors (RTTs) were fabricated using graphene and h-BN barriers with different numbers of atomic layers, showing a mechanism enabling the observation of NDR in high current density devices. A triangular etching approach was proposed to suppress the effects of graphene–metal contact resistance and graphene sheet resistance, enabling pronounced NDR effect even in a 2D tunneling device with a single atomic layer h-BN barrier. A room-temperature peak current density up to 2700 μA/μm 2 and operational frequencies up to 11 GHz were achieved, demonstrating the potential of 2D quantum NDR devices for applications in high-speed electronics.