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MESFET stands for metal–semiconductor field effect transistor. It is quite similar to a JFET in construction and terminology. The difference is that instead of using a p-n junction for a gate, a Schottky (metal-semiconductor) junction is used. MESFETs are usually constructed in compound semiconductor technologies lacking high quality surface passivation such as GaAs, InP, or SiC, and are faster but more expensive than silicon-based JFETs or MOSFETs. Production MESFETs are operated up to approximately 45 GHz,[1] and are commonly used for microwave frequency communications and radar. The first MESFETs were developed in 1966, and a year later their extremely high frequency RF microwave performance was demonstrated.[2] From a digital circuit design perspective, it is increasingly difficult to use MESFETs as the basis for digital integrated circuits as the scale of integration goes up, compared to CMOS silicon based fabrication.

Functional Architecture[edit]

MESFET schematic.



Numerous MESFET fabrication possibilities have been explored for a wide variety of semiconductor systems. Some of the main application areas are:

See also[edit]


  1. ^ Lepkowski, W.; Wilk, S.J.; Thornton, T.J. (2009), "45 GHz Silicon MESFETs on a 0.15 μm SOI CMOS Process", SOI Conference, 2009 IEEE International (Foster City, CA): 1–2, ISBN 978-1-4244-4256-0, ISSN 1078-621X 
  2. ^ GaAs FET MESFET