NEW REDUCTION-MECHANISM OF THE STRESS LEAKAGE CURRENT BASED ON THE DEACTIVATION OF STEP TUNNELING SITES FOR THIN OXIDE-FILMS

This paper describes a new reduction mechanism of the stress induced l eakage current that is induced by step tunneling of electrons through the step tunneling sites. The concept of this mechanism is based on th e deactivation of step tunneling sites for thin oxide. It is verified that the deactivation is electrically realized by the injected electro ns into the sites. It is because the step tunneling probability of ele ctrons though the deactivated sites is suppressed, since the electron capture cross section of the neutralized deactivation sites becomes ex tremely low. The deactivation scheme is as follows: (1) The deactivati on of tunneling sites can be realized that the tunneling sites trapped holes change to neutralized tunneling sites due to electrons injectio n. (2) The injected electron can deactivate the activation tunneling s ites only under energy level than the energy level of the injected ele ctrons. It is shown that the above reduction phenomenon can be quantif iably with formulation. These results are very important for high reli able thin oxide films and for high performance ULSI.