IEEE Journal of the Electron Devices Society (Jan 2016)

Impact of Hot Carrier Aging on Random Telegraph Noise and Within a Device Fluctuation

  • Azrif B. Manut,
  • Jian Fu Zhang,
  • Meng Duan,
  • Zhigang Ji,
  • Wei Dong Zhang,
  • Ben Kaczer,
  • Tom Schram,
  • Naoto Horiguchi,
  • Guido Groeseneken

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1109/JEDS.2015.2502760
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 4, no. 1
pp. 15 – 21

Abstract

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For nanometer MOSFETs, charging and discharging a single trap induces random telegraph noise (RTN). When there are more than a few traps, RTN signal becomes complex and appears as within a device fluctuation (WDF). RTN/WDF causes jitters in switch timing and is a major challenge to low power circuits. In addition to RTN/WDF, devices also age. The interaction between RTN/WDF and aging is of importance and not fully understood. Some researchers reported aging increasing RTN/WDF, while others showed RTN/WDF being hardly affected by aging. The objective of this paper is to investigate the impact of hot carrier aging (HCA) on the RTN/WDF of nMOSFETs. For devices of average RTN/WDF, it is found that the effect of HCA is generally modest. For devices of abnormally high RTN/WDF, however, for the first time, we report HCA reducing RTN/WDF substantially (>50%). This reduction originates from either a change of current distribution or defect losses.

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