WLR monitoring methodology for assessing charging damage on oxides thicker than 4nm using antenna structures

Quantifying charging damage in gate oxides of antenna structures for WLR monitoring

“…Antenna and reference nMOS devices were stressed identically with various current densities injected in inversion polarity into the gate oxide [7]. Data from stress sequences up to oxide breakdown were recorded in order to determine the appropriate fit parameters to equation (5), which show clearly the two predicted regimes, see Fig.…”

“…Several ways of evaluating antenna data were proposed to assess the plasma induced damage done to the gate oxide [2][3][4]7,12]. One question often asked when dealing with detected charging damage is its relevance in terms of lifetime reduction or increase in failure probability.…”

Reliability of gate dielectrics and metal–insulator–metal capacitors

“…Due to plasma induced charging of the dielectric layer the lifetime can be significantly reduced [35][36][37]. In most cases PID cannot be completely ruled out from very early processing steps, such as polysilicon etch or contact hole etch, even when the dielectric test structure is protected by diodes connecting gate to bulk.…”