Performance of Thin-Film Ferroelectric Capacitors for EMC Decoupling

This paper studied the effects of thin-film ferroelectrics as decoupling capacitors for electromagnetic compatibility applications. The impedance and insertion loss of PZT capacitors were measured and compared with the results from commercial off-the-shelf capacitors. An equivalent circuit model was extracted from the experimental results, and a considerable series resistance was found to exist in ferroelectric capacitors. This resistance gives rise to the observed performance difference around series resonance between ferroelectric PZT capacitors and normal capacitors. Measurements on paraelectric (Ba,Sr)TiO3-based integrated varactors do not show this significant resistance. Some analyses were made to investigate the mechanisms, and it was found that it can be due to the hysteresis in the ferroelectric thin films.