The meta-stable dip (MSD) effect in SOI FinFETs

The meta-stable dip (MSD) effect is demonstrated and characterized in SOI FinFETs. With ascending scan of front-gate voltage (VG1), the magnitude of drain current (ID) tends to be fixed within a specific region of the front-gate voltage and this leads to a dip of transconductance (gm). The dip width can be modulated through a control of bias condition or measurement speed such as back-gate voltage (VG2), drain voltage (VD) and step size of the front-gate voltage. From the dual-gate transient measurement, it is found that the MSD effect is highly dependent on the floating-body effect. In SOI FinFETs, the MSD effect is significantly affected by the fin width due to the fringing electric field of the lateral gates.