Hole trapping in thin gate oxides during Fowler - Nordheim constant current stress

A theoretical analysis of positive charge trapping characteristics for thin (22 - 33 nm) gate oxides of metal - oxide - semiconductor (MOS) capacitors during Fowler - Nordheim (FN) constant current injection at a low electron-injection fluence is presented. Tunnelling electrons from the quantized subband of the accumulation layer, which has formed in the n-Si substrate with -polysilicon gate at positive bias, are assumed to initiate the band-to-band impact ionization (BTBII) process in . BTBII is considered to be responsible for positive charge generation in the bulk of the oxide. Utilizing the available experimental data for thin oxides at a constant current density of , the present analysis has been extended to predict the trapping characteristics at various constant tunnelling current densities ranging from 0.1 to .