Abstract
This chapter focuses on theory of thermal breakdown and continues with theory and experimental description of breakdown first in semiconductors and then in insulators. Thermal breakdown voltages on the application of pulses are larger than the steady state breakdown voltages. Information on the basic breakdown properties of many substances is imperfect and relatively few insulators have been investigated in detail. An average temperature of the breakdown events during vaporization was obtained in metal oxide semiconductor (MOS) samples by photographing the spectrum of discharges and comparing the intensities of spectral lines. The calculation of the breakdown strength by impact ionization requires the solution of the Boltzmann equation, considering the effects of applied field, phonon, and interelectronic collisions, ionizations, and recombinations on the free electron distribution function. The statistical breakdown events observed in the oxides may also be explained by the development of critical size avalanches, if it is assumed that this depends on particular transport and trapping properties of the holes and on field emission at the cathode.
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