The determination of the energy distribution of interface traps in metal-nitride-oxide-silicon (memory) devices using non-steady-state techniques

Abstract

New techniques are used to study the emission and generation processes through, and to obtain the energy distribution of, interface traps situated throughout the bandgap of MNOS devices. The techniques are based on thermal and isothermal dielectric relaxation current techniques. The trap distribution is observed to contain two peaks, the maxima of which occur at 0·4 eV and 0·74 eV below the bottom of the conduction band. The results of the two techniques compared extremely well, lending confidence to the techniques. It is demonstrated that the techniques are capable of detecting small changes in the trap density, such as might occur due to ageing or temperature cycling.