Autocorrelation Analysis as a Technique to Study Physical Mechanisms of MOSFET Low-Frequency Noise

Abstract

A low-frequency noise (LFN) analysis technique is introduced, based on the autocorrelation of the LFN spectra in terms of frequency, biasing, and temperature. This technique reveals information about the mechanisms behind 1/ <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${f}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> noise that is difficult to obtain otherwise. These correlation analyses provide strong evidence that the LFN of both nMOS and pMOS transistors is mainly composed of the superposition of thermally activated random telegraph signals (RTSs). The methodology enables quantification and validation of old and new LFN models, and, therefore, helps to clarify the relation between RTS and 1/ <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${f}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> that is still frequently debated in the literature.