Estimation of trap distribution by the temperature spectrum of space charge decay

Abstract

The energy band structure is crucial for solid insulation research. The traditional thermally stimulated current is used mostly for direct trap estimation but has some limitations, which can be overcome by the space charge decay method. With the help of a modified pulsed-electro acoustic system, we perform the test under different low temperatures and obtain a more comprehensive band spectrum including shallow traps and different polarities. This study chooses isotactic polypropylene (PP) to investigate in a temperature range of −120 to 20 °C. Signal processing and recovery are considered. Two basic trap estimation methods are compared and the one based on the modified isothermal relaxation current theory is used here. The electron and hole trap densities near different electrode interfaces are considered in the experiment. In the preliminary results, it is found that the traps tend to move toward a shallow direction with a decrease in temperature. A model of the retrapping process caused by phonon scattering is put forward to explain the results. The retrapping possibility is, therefore, assumed to follow a power relation with temperature. An attempt to rectify the trap depth is performed on such a model by numerical approximation and reaches the result that the retrapping possibility may be dependent upon the second power of temperature. Finally, the broadband energy spectrum is calculated after correction. In the normalized coordinate system, the traps in PP are mainly distributed in a deep range; few shallow traps are found maybe because the space charge density is low.