Chemical states and electronic structure of a HfO(-2) / Ge(001) interface

We report the chemical bonding structure and valence band alignment at the HfO{sub 2}/Ge (001) interface by systematically probing various core level spectra as well as valence band spectra using soft x-rays at the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory. We investigated the chemical bonding changes as a function of depth through the dielectric stack by taking a series of synchrotron photoemission spectra as we etched through the HfO{sub 2} film using a dilute HF-solution. We found that a very non-stoichiometric GeO{sub x} layer exists at the HfO{sub 2}/Ge interface. The valence band spectra near the Fermi level in each different film structure were carefully analyzed, and as a result, the valence band offset between Ge and GeO{sub x} was determined to be {Delta}E{sub v} (Ge-GeO{sub x}) = 2.2 {+-} 0.15 eV, and that between Ge and HfO{sub 2}, {Delta}E{sub v} (Ge-HfO{sub 2}) = 2.7 {+-} 0.15 eV