An analysis of current saturation mechanism of junction field-effect transistors

Abstract

A two-dimensional numerical analysis has been amde for junction field-effect transistors with small and large values of length-to-width ratio. Comparison of the results for different drain bias voltages shows the cause of the saturation of the drain current and the finite differential drain conductance in the saturation region. The effects of the geometry of the device and the field dependent mobility to the drain characteristics are clarified. Detailed pictures of the free carrier density distribution are presented, and the minimum channel width and the channel length are given for various bias conditions. A conduction path from the source to the drain with appreciable free carrier density has been found for bias conditions normally considered as pinched-off conditions. The drain characteristic with gate bias voltage is seen to be equivalent to that of a device with correspondingly smaller width and zero gate bias.