Thin body switch transistor

1. A method, comprising:

etching portions of an insulator material formed on semiconductor material to expose a surface of the semiconductor material;

recessing a portion of the semiconductor material via an oxidation process which forms an oxide region and a subsequent etching process to remove the oxide region thereby exposing the recessed portion of the semiconductor material, wherein the semiconductor material is silicon on insulator (SOI) material and the oxidation process forms the oxide region within the SOI material;

forming at least one gate structure within the recessed portion of the semiconductor material; and

forming channel regions for the at least one gate structure on both a recessed SOI region and a thicker SOI region, wherein the recessed SOI region is surrounded by the thicker SOI region which is protected during the oxidation process and the removing of the oxide region.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the recessing of the semiconductor material includes thinning of the semiconductor material.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein:

the oxidation process includes oxidizing an exposed portion of the semiconductor material to form the oxide region in the exposed portion of the semiconductor material; and

the etching process includes removing the oxide region to form a thinned portion of the semiconductor material.

4. The method of claim 3 , further comprising forming channel regions for the at least one gate structure on the thinned portion of the semiconductor material comprising the recessed portion and thicker portions of the semiconductor material comprising a non-recessed portion of the semiconductor material.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein the non-recessed portion completely surrounds the recessed portion.

6. The method of claim 4 , wherein the at least one gate structure extends between the recessed portion of the semiconductor material and the non-recessed portion of the semiconductor material.

7. The method of claim 3 , wherein the at least one gate structure is formed by deposition of a gate dielectric material on the thinned portion of the semiconductor material within the recessed portion and a deposition and patterning of gate material on the gate dielectric material.

8. The method of claim 2 , further comprising protecting non-recessed portions of the semiconductor material from the oxidation process.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein the recessed portion is a thinned portion formed with a thickness less than surrounding portions of the semiconductor material.

10. The method of claim 9 , wherein the thinned portion has a thickness of 300Å to 1000 Å.

11. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one gate structure extends onto the thicker SOI region.

12. The method of claim 1 , wherein the recessed portion undergoes a dopant implant process to form a well implant.

13. A method, comprising:

exposing a surface of a silicon on insulator (SOI) material;

performing an oxidation process on the exposed surface of the SOI material to form an oxide region within the SOI material;

removing the oxide region to form a thinned SOI region of the SOI material;

forming a gate structure on the thinned SOI region of the SOI material; and

forming channel regions for the gate structure, on both the thinned SOI region and a thicker SOI region,

wherein the thinned SOI region is surrounded by the thicker SOI region which is protected during the oxidation process and the removing of the oxide region, and the gate structure extends onto the thicker SOI region.

14. The method of claim 13 , wherein the exposing the surface of the SOI material comprises etching a masking layer and underlying insulator layer, formed above the SOI material.

15. The method of claim 13 , wherein a body contact region is formed on the thicker SOI region.

16. The method of claim 13 , wherein the thinned SOI region is less than about 1000 Å in thickness 1000 A.

17. The method of claim 16 , wherein the thinned SOI region is about 300 Å in thickness.