Improved Self-Curing Effect in a MOSFET With Gate Biasing

Stress-induced damage in a MOSFET can be cured by Joule heating, which can be produced by an intentional forward junction current ( ${I}_{\textbf {FWD}}$ ). This curing effect can be further enhanced by the simultaneous application of gate biasing, which does not influence the ${I}_{\textbf {FWD}}$ . A MOSFET was intentionally degraded by harsh hot-carrier injection (HCI) then the damage was cured and nearly returned to its pristine state. The improved self-curing effect was quantitatively verified using low-frequency noise (LFN) analyses. Self-curing by internal heat from the ${I}_{\textbf {FWD}}$ more effectively cured the HCI damage than a nonself-curing using external heat from a hot chuck.