Direct photo emission motion observation of current filaments in the IGBT under avalanche breakdown condition

Endo, Koichi; Nagamine, Shinji; Saito, Wataru; Matsudai, Tomoko; Ogura, T.; Setoya, Takashi; Nakamae, Koji

doi:10.1109/ispsd.2016.7520854

Cited by 11 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…The generation of a current filament increases the temperature and differential resistance within a region of the device, prompting the current filament to move toward regions with lower temperature and differential resistance. The phenomenon of current filament movement has been experimentally observed in the literature [8,24,[29][30][31], consistent with our simulation and theoretical analysis. The above thermostatic simulation results indicate that the current filament generated by the FS-IGBT in avalanche mode remains stationary because the simulation does not account for the effects of temperature rise.…”

Section: Physical Mechanisms For Driving the Movement Of Current Fila...supporting

confidence: 91%

Section: Physical Mechanisms For Driving the Movement Of Current Fila...supporting

confidence: 91%

“…Many studies have shown that when the device operates in the negative differential resistance (NDR) region of the avalanche breakdown curve, a localized aggregation of currents (current filaments) induced by the avalanche effect occurs within the device [4][5][6][7]. The concentration effect of avalanche current leads to the gathering of avalanche energy at the location of the current filament, significantly reducing the device's robustness to avalanche breakdown and possibly leading to device failure [8][9][10][11][12]. When avalanche breakdown occurs in a device due to significant power dissipation, it is generally not feasible to test it directly through experiments.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Effects of Current Filaments on IGBT Avalanche Robustness: A Simulation Study

Zhang,

Luo,

et al. 2024

Electronics

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With the increase in voltage level and current capacity of the insulated gate bipolar transistor (IGBT), the avalanche effect has become an important factor limiting the safe operating area (SOA) of the device. The hole injection into the p/n junction on the backside of the IGBT after avalanche is the main feature that distinguishes the avalanche effect from other devices. In this paper, the avalanche breakdown characteristics of IGBT and the nature of current filament are investigated using theoretical analysis and numerical simulation, and the underlying physical mechanism controlling the nature of current filaments is revealed. The results show that the hole injection on the backside of the IGBT leads to an additional negative differential resistance (NDR) branch on the avalanche breakdown curve. The device’s common-base current gain, αpnp, is a crucial factor in determining the current filament. As αpnp increases, the avalanche-induced current filament becomes stronger and slower, resulting in weaker avalanche robustness of the device.

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Section: Physical Mechanisms For Driving the Movement Of Current Fila...supporting

confidence: 91%

Section: Physical Mechanisms For Driving the Movement Of Current Fila...supporting

confidence: 91%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Effects of Current Filaments on IGBT Avalanche Robustness: A Simulation Study

Zhang,

Luo,

et al. 2024

Electronics

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“…[11][12][13][14][15] Different approaches such as Quasi-3D simulation, 16) prediction from half-cell simulation, 17) full chip simulation using network model, 18) and 3D single cell electro-thermal simulation 19) were also reported. On the other hand, it was experimentally observed [20][21][22][23][24][25] that the current filaments are formed and they move around inside the IGBT chip during UIS.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Impact of 3D simulation on the analysis of unclamped inductive switching

Tanaka¹,

Abe²,

Nakagawa³

2020

Jpn. J. Appl. Phys.

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Unclamped inductive switching (UIS) is a crucial topic for modern power devices. The UIS failure analysis has been done by 2D Technology CAD (TCAD) simulations due to the restrictions of computation capabilities. In this paper, the detailed UIS failure mechanism for IGBT was analyzed by large scale 3D TCAD simulations. The authors propose that there are two kinds of current filaments. These are avalanche induced current filament and temperature induced current filament. The avalanche induced current filament firstly developed and moved around during the UIS operation. It finally caused local latch-up. The local temperature rapidly increased by the latch-up. This triggered a destructive temperature induced current filament, which stayed in the same location and caused device failure. It was also found that these phenomena were accurately treated only by large scale 3D simulation of at least 160 µm × 160 µm device area.

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Gated imaging of dynamic photon emission in mixed-signal and power devices

Zhang

Brillert

2017

2017 IEEE 24th International Symposium on the Physical and Failure Analysis of Integrated Circuits (IPFA)

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Direct photo emission motion observation of current filaments in the IGBT under avalanche breakdown condition

Cited by 11 publications

References 9 publications

Effects of Current Filaments on IGBT Avalanche Robustness: A Simulation Study

Effects of Current Filaments on IGBT Avalanche Robustness: A Simulation Study

Impact of 3D simulation on the analysis of unclamped inductive switching

Gated imaging of dynamic photon emission in mixed-signal and power devices

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