Direct tunneling gate current in deep submicron MOSFETs

Direct tunneling gate current in MOS structures with ultra-thin gate-oxides in the presence of inelastic scattering in oxide region is studied using a new technique. Numerically calculated results for nMOS devices show that due to inelastic scattering, gate current increases in devices with oxide thickness equal to 2 nm or higher. Inelastic scattering effects are more pronounced at lower gate voltages. However, when the oxide thickness is reduced below 2 nm, inelastic scattering has no significant effect on gate current.