Resistance Quenching in Graphene Interconnects

TL;DR

This study experimentally examines how the electrical resistance of graphene interconnects decreases significantly with temperature increase, highlighting effects relevant for their use in integrated circuits.

Contribution

It provides new experimental data on the temperature-dependent resistance behavior of graphene interconnects fabricated by focused ion beam from exfoliated graphene.

Findings

Resistance drops by 30% for single-layer and 70% for bi-layer graphene from 300K to 500K.

Resistance change explained by electron-hole pair generation and phonon scattering.

Results support potential use of graphene as high-temperature interconnects.

Abstract

We investigated experimentally the high-temperature electrical resistance of graphene interconnects. The test structures were fabricated using the focused ion beam from the single and bi-layer graphene produced by mechanical exfoliation. It was found that as temperature increases from 300 to 500K the resistance of the single- and bi-layer graphene interconnects drops down by 30% and 70%, respectively. The quenching and temperature dependence of the resistance were explained by the thermal generation of the electron-hole pairs and acoustic phonon scattering. The obtained results are important for the proposed applications of graphene as interconnects in integrated circuits.