Radiation Induced Breakdown in 1.7 nm Oxynitrided Gate Oxides

The present work not only extend SEGR results down to 1.7nm gate oxides thickness, but also investigates new SEGR aspects in ultra-thin oxides, such as the effect of the gate polarity during irradiation, the non-hard breakdown characteristics appearing during SEGR, and the breakdown in pMOS devices. We address also the problem of correctly evaluating the oxide field during irradiation, when a high gate current is present owing to a high electron tunneling injection across the oxide.