Modeling of nonlinearities in the capacitance-voltage characteristics of high-k metal-insulator-metal capacitors

Metal-insulator-metal capacitors using high-k oxides are known to display nonlinear capacitance-voltage (C-V) characteristics. In the present work it is proposed that such nonlinearities arise from an electrode polarization mechanism. By considering a field activated hopping conduction in the bulk (related to oxygen vacancies), a simple analytical expression is derived which relates the capacitance to the applied bias. The model is able to predict voltage coefficients of capacitance and is found to be in good agreement with experimental C-V.