Mechanism Analysis and Multi-Scale Protection Design of GaN HEMT Induced by High-Power Electromagnetic Pulse

Abstract

Currently, severe electromagnetic circumstances pose a serious threat to electronic systems. In this paper, the damage effects of a high-power electromagnetic pulse (EMP) on the GaN high-electron-mobility transistor (HEMT) were investigated in detail. The mechanism is presented by analyzing the variation in the internal distribution of multiple physical quantities in the device. The results reveal that the device damage was dominated by different thermal accumulation effects such as self-heating, avalanche breakdown and hot carrier emission during the action of the high-power EMP. Furthermore, a multi-scale protection design for the GaN HEMT against high-power electromagnetic interference (EMI) is presented and verified by a simulation study. The device structure optimization results demonstrate that the symmetrical structure, with the same distance from the gate to drain (Lgd) and gate to source (Lgs), possesses a higher damage threshold compared to the asymmetrical structure, and that a proper passivation layer, which enhances the breakdown characteristics, can improve the anti-EMI capability. The circuit optimization results present the influences of external components on the damage progress. The findings show that the resistive components which are in series at the source and gate will strengthen the capability of the device to withstand high-power EMP damage. All of the above conclusions are important for device reliability design using gallium nitride materials, especially when the device operates under severe electromagnetic circumstances.

Effect of Fe Doping Profile on Current Collapse in GaN‐based RF HEMTs

“…Physics‐based models such as drift‐diffusion model for carrier transport, Fermi–Dirac statistics, and Shockley‐Read–Hall (SRH) models for trap‐assisted carrier transport are enabled [18] . The polarization model is also considered because of the spontaneous and piezoelectric polarizations of AlGaN/GaN HEMTs [23,24] . Due to the high thermal conductivity of the SiC substrate and the absence of heat accumulation in pulsed I D ‐V DS characteristics, self‐heating is disregarded [25] .…”

“…[18] The polarization model is also considered because of the spontaneous and piezoelectric polarizations of AlGaN/ GaN HEMTs. [23,24] Due to the high thermal conductivity of the SiC substrate and the absence of heat accumulation in pulsed I D -V DS characteristics, self-heating is disregarded. [25] To focus on the bulk trapping effect, impact ionization is neglected to exclude all surface-related trapping effect.…”

Electromagnetic Susceptibility Analysis of the Operational Amplifier to Conducted EMI Injected through the Power Supply Port

“…As chips become more integrated and data processing becomes faster, the electromagnetic interference (EMI) of chips must be methodically considered [ 8 , 9 , 10 ]. In addition, integrated circuits face more complex electromagnetic environments [ 3 , 11 ].…”

Plasma-discharge-integrated structure for microwave power limiter

“…The RADAR system technology that protects against front-door coupling can be categorized into various types such as solidstate, ferrite, and plasma types; when they operate ideally, the insertion loss must be below a speci c input power value, and the loss must be generated above a speci c input power value in order to function as a protection device. Solid-state limiters and semiconductor-based protection devices consist of P-I-N diodes, Schottky diodes, and eld effect transistor devices [23][24][25][26] . The most representative semiconductor limiter, which comprises a parallel P-I-N diode, has the advantage of having a low insertion loss value in a low-power input signal.…”