A new self-consistent model for the analysis of hot-carrier induced degradation in lightly doped drain (LDD) and gate overlapped LDD polysilicon TFTs

Abstract Hot-carrier induced degradation is a main issue in the electrical stability of polysilicon TFTs and drain field relief architectures have been introduced, such as lightly doped drain (LDD) and gate overlapped LDD (GOLDD), to improve the stability. Bias-stress experiments were performed on both LDD and GOLDD structures, biasing the devices above pinch-off at constant V g and different V ds . While the LDD structure presented considerable hot-carrier induced degradation, GOLDD devices were characterised by a very high electrical stability. To explain such a difference in electrical stability, we first analysed the spatial distributions of the electric fields, which are lower in GOLDD structures. In addition, we developed a new model to describe the hot-carrier induced degradation, based on the correlation between hot carrier injection currents and interface state generation. Indeed, hot carrier injection is known to produce interface states and oxide trapped charge, and, depending upon their spatial distribution, can strongly influence the local electric fields as well as the current. The proposed model nicely reproduces the degraded characteristics, thus providing indications on the spatial distribution of the generated interface states.