Source–drain switching characteristics when coupled with a gate-controlled DBD in a microplasma switch

Abstract

Microplasma switches have attracted considerable attention in harsh environment applications, such as satellites, space exploration, nuclear reactors, and oil drilling, because of their inherent characteristics. A microplasma switch is generally constructed from a source, drain, and gate electrodes, and current conduction is generated between the drain and source (DS), and modulated by the gate. In this work, to improve the gate lifespan and device stability, a microplasma switch with a gate dielectric barrier structure is fabricated due to the even and stable discharge of a dielectric barrier discharge (DBD), and a parameterized nanosecond pulse voltage signal is applied to the gate. Under the effect of the DS voltage, a pulsed DS current is triggered by the gate pulse since a large number of charged particles are generated by the gate DBD, which shows that the DS switching behavior is triggered by the gate pulse. The microplasma switch operates stably (with an average delay jitter of less than 50 ps) at the repetition frequencies (up to 80 kHz). Moreover, the influence of experimental conditions on the switching performance is systematically investigated. The conduction current and delay, which are related to the discharge intensity and speed, are influenced by the electric-field strength of the channel (determined from the pulse amplitude and DS voltage) and its variation rate (determined from the rising and falling edge time of the pulse). In addition, the device performance is influenced by varying the breakdown voltage of the DS (determined from the gas pressure multiplied by DS spacing), which can result in variation of the working coefficient. It is also influenced by varying the wall voltage (decided by pulse width and frequency), which can result in the decrease in the total voltage of the channel.