MetalOxideSemiconductorSensoren

Metal-oxide semiconductor (MOS) refers to a class of electronic devices that use a metal-oxide-insulator-semiconductor structure as the gate interface in a transistor or capacitor. The most prominent example is the metal-oxide semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET), in which a thin oxide layer separates a gate electrode from a semiconductor substrate. By applying a voltage to the gate, an inversion or depletion layer forms in the semiconductor, modulating current flow and enabling amplification and switching.

Historically, MOS devices were developed in the 1960s by researchers including Mohamed Atalla and Dawon Kahng, and they quickly became the dominant technology for integrated circuits due to low power consumption, high input impedance, and scalability. Early MOS structures used silicon dioxide as the gate insulator and polysilicon or metal gates; as circuits scaled, researchers adopted high-k dielectrics and metal or metal-gate approaches to reduce leakage and improve performance.

Device types include enhancement-mode and depletion-mode MOS transistors, with NMOS and PMOS variants. The MOS capacitor, a simplified MOIS structure, is fundamental for understanding threshold voltage, capacitance-voltage behavior, and reliability concerns. Modern mainstream devices employ advanced architectures such as FinFETs and gate-all-around transistors, featuring three-dimensional channel geometries to sustain scaling, drive strength, and control of short-channel effects.

Materials and processing advances have shifted from silicon dioxide to thin, high-quality gate dielectrics and metal or alloy gates, enabling continued improvements in speed, density, and energy efficiency. MOS technology remains foundational to digital logic, memory, and analog circuits in contemporary electronics.