Impact of transistor scaling on the time-dependent dielectric breakdown (TDDB) reliability of analog circuits

摘要

This paper discusses the dielectric breakdown reliability of a two-stage operational amplifier across four short-channel device technologies. For a long time, time dependent dielectric breakdown (TDDB) impact was only confined to digital circuits as the electric field across the gate oxide is relatively large despite being applied in accordance with the activity factor. However, in analog circuits, electric field is generally smaller, though it is constant. One particular aspect that was of interest is the change in TDDB reliability of analog circuits when the device technology descends into deep nanoscale regime. This paper shows that the amplifier reliability becomes mostly enhanced as the transistor technology scales down from 90nm to 32 nm.