Time-Dependent Dielectric Breakdown of Commercial 1.2 kV 4H-SiC Power MOSFETs

Abstract

Constant-voltage time-dependent dielectric breakdown (TDDB) measurements are performed on recently manufactured commercial 1.2 kV 4H-SiC power metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) field-effect transistors (MOSFETs) from three vendors. Abrupt changes of the electric field acceleration parameters ( γ) are observed at oxide electric fields ( E <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">ox</sub> ) around 8.5 MV/cm to 9 MV/cm for all commercial MOSFETs. Gate leakage currents and threshold voltage shifts are also monitored under different oxide fields ( E <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">ox</sub> = 8 MV/cm and 10 MV/cm). The results suggest the failure mode under high oxide electric field is modified by impact ionization or Anode Hole Injection (AHI) induced hole trapping. This observation agrees with previously published oxide reliability studies on SiC MOSFETs and suggests that constant-voltage TDDB measurements need to be carefully performed under low oxide fields to avoid lifetime overestimation caused by hole trapping. The extrapolated t <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">63%</sub> lifetimes (times to 63% failures) from TDDB measurements performed at E <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">ox</sub> <; 8.5 MV/cm are longer than 10 <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">8</sup> hours at 150°C for all vendors. The predicted lifetimes at E <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">ox</sub> = 4 MV/cm demonstrate more than 10 <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">5</sup> times increases than the oxide lifetimes reported a decade ago, showing promising progress in SiC technology.