Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2011
We report on the in-situ measurement of temperature, i.e., self-heating effects, in multi-finger AlGaN/GaN HFETs grown on SiC substrates. Optical micro-spectroscopy was used to measure temperature with 1m spatial resolution. Thermal resistance (temperature rise per W/mm) was measured as a function of device pitch and gate finger width. There is significant thermal cross talk in multi-finger AlGaN/GaN HFETs and this needs to be seriously considered for device performance and ultimately device reliability. A comparison with theoretical modeling is presented. Uncertainties in modeling parameters currently make modeling less reliable than experimental temperature assessment of devices.