Metallurgy

Materials science

Optoelectronics

Engineering

Focused ion beam

Economics

Power MOSFET

Physics

Transistor

JFET

Optics

Macroeconomics

Leakage (economics)

Silicon

Quantum mechanics

Voltage

Field-effect transistor

Microbeam

Silicon carbide

Electrical engineering

Gate oxide

MOSFET

IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science

Heavy-ion microbeams are employed for probing the radiation-sensitive regions in commercial silicon carbide (SiC) vertical double-diffused power (VD)-MOSFETs with micrometer accuracy. By scanning the beam spot over the die, a spatial periodicity was observed in the leakage current degradation, reflecting the striped structure of the power MOSFET investigated. Two different mechanisms were observed for degradation. At low drain bias (gate and source grounded), only the gate-oxide (at the JFET or neck region) is contributing in the ion-induced leakage current. For exposures at drain-source bias voltages higher than a specific threshold, additional higher drain leakage current is observed in the p-n junction region. This provides useful insights into the understanding of basic phenomena of single-event effects in SiC power devices.

Heavy-Ion Microbeam Studies of Single-Event Leakage Current Mechanism in SiC VD-MOSFETs