Influence of Spacer Thickness on the Noise Performance in InP HEMTs for Cryogenic LNAs

InP high electron mobility transistors (InP HEMTs) with different spacer thickness 1 to 7 nm in the InAlAs-InGaAs heterostructure have been fabricated and characterized at 5 K with respect to electrical dc and rf properties. The InP HEMT noise performance was extracted from gain and noise measurements of a hybrid low-noise amplifier (LNA) at 5 K equipped with discrete transistors. When biased for optimal noise operation, the LNA using 5 nm spacer thickness InP HEMTs achieved the lowest average noise temperature of 1.4 K at 4-8 GHz. The InP HEMT channel noise was estimated from the drain noise temperature which confirmed the minimum in noise temperature for the 5 nm spacer thickness InP HEMT. It is suggested that the spacer thickness acts to control the degree of real-space transfer of electrons from the channel to the barrier responsible for the observed noise variation in the cryogenic InP HEMTs.

Automated summary

In this study, InP HEMTs with different spacer thicknesses (1 to 7 nm) were fabricated and characterized. The electrical dc and rf properties of the InP HEMTs were evaluated at 5 K. The lowest average noise temperature was achieved by the InP HEMTs with a 5 nm spacer thickness in the 4-8 GHz frequency range. The spacer thickness was found to influence the noise performance of the InP HEMTs by controlling the real-space transfer of electrons.