A study of electronic transport and breakdown in SiO2
Abstract
Transport of electrons in silicon dioxide, at high electric fields, has been of much interest for quite some time. In spite of this, the role of various scattering processes has not yet been sorted out. At low fields, electrons show a mobility in the 20 to 30 sq cm/V-sec range, and at high fields (of the order of 1 mV/cm) begin to exhibit hot carrier effects. The polar modes are the dominant electron scatterers for fields up to 1.5 to 2 mV/cm, and beyond this, runaway begins to occur. Experimentally, it is found that the electron distribution function stabilizes at an average energy around 3 eV for fields above 3 mV/cm, which requires the onset of additional scattering processes. The current understanding of the transport and scattering processes is reviewed. In particular, the role of Umklapp processes, and intervalley processes, is discussed. Calculations utilizing an ensemble Monte Carlo technique are used to study the various processes.
- Publication:
-
Arizona State University Technical Report
- Pub Date:
- March 1988
- Bibcode:
- 1988asu..rept.....F
- Keywords:
-
- Charge Carriers;
- Electric Fields;
- High Energy Electrons;
- Transport Properties;
- Distribution Functions;
- Monte Carlo Method;
- Scattering;
- Silicon Dioxide;
- Solid-State Physics