Simulation of Neutron and Proton Displacement Damage in Ultra-Wide Bandgap Semiconductor Ga2O3

Recently, gallium oxide (Ga2O3) as an ultra-wide bandgap oxide semiconductor has aroused enormous attention in research and development due to its prospects for future power electronic, optoelectronic, and radiation detection applications. Ga2O3-based devices could be subject to fluxes of protons or neutrons if used in aerospace or radiation-hard nuclear systems, which leads to internal defects in Ga2O3 crystals and the degradation of device performance. Therefore, the radiation effects of Ga2O3 under irradiation have become a research focus, and it is of great significance to study the defect behavior and performance influence of Ga2O3 after irradiation. In this paper, the number of displacement defects produced by 1∼20 MeV neutrons in Ga2O3 were calculated using Geant4 simulations, and the factors that impact the displacement damage were studied. The results show that the displacement defects generated by neutrons do not increase monotonously with neutron energy but are closely related to the reaction cross-section and the generation of (PKA). We simulated and calculated the radiation damage by 10∼100keV protons in Ga2O3 using SRIM. It is found that ionization damage is much greater than displacement damage; the number of vacancies generated by proton radiation in Ga2O3 increases with the energy and incident angle of the incident proton. The irradiation resistance of Ga2O3 is between silicon and diamond semiconductor materials.