High-power microwave pulse induced failure on InGaP/GaAs heterojunction bipolar transistor

Abstract

With the development of microwave technology, the reliability of semiconductor devices under high-power microwave (HPM) interference has become one of the huge challenges. On this basis, the damage effect of InGaP/GaAs heterojunction bipolar transistor (HBT) under HPM interference is studied by simulation and experiment. We first establish the experimental platform and obtain the damage threshold of InGaP/GaAs HBT under HPM injection with different pulse widths. The change of S Parameters indicates that permanent damage occurs on the HBT when the input power is 46.1 dBm with the pulse width of 50 ns. In addition, the experimental results show that with the increase pulse width, the damage power threshold decreases while the damage energy threshold increases. Besides, the damage power threshold does not change when the pulse width is more than 500 ns. The simulation model for analyzing the damage mechanism of HBT is established. Simulation results show that hot spots appear in the center of the emitter region under HPM injection, indicating that this region may be burned out and cause the malfunction of HBT.