Extraction of the carrier generation and recombination lifetime from the forward characteristics of advanced diodes

Abstract

This paper proposes to extract the generation and recombination lifetime simultaneously from the recombination current in forward operation. The method is applied to n +–p-well junctions fabricated in advanced processing schemes on silicon wafers with different grown-in defect concentrations. The value of the recombination lifetime is confirmed by the data obtained from the cross-sectional microwave absorption (MWA) technique. It is also shown that the obtained generation lifetime agrees well with the one found from the reverse current after correction for the generation width and the electric field. In conclusion, the proposed method gives reasonable values for the generation and recombination lifetime in advanced silicon p–n junctions. Mostly, these junctions will be dominated by the processing-induced defects.