Simulation of forward bias injection in proton irradiated silicon pn-junctions

A multilevel recombination model is implemented in the simulation program MEDICI to simulate proton irradiated silicon. First the model is used to simulate charge carrier distributions in proton irradiated silicon p(+)n-diodes in order to evaluate deep level transient spectroscopy (DLTS) measurements of minority carrier capture. Knowledge of the amount of injected carriers makes it possible to extract quantitative information from minority carrier temperature spectra, and minority carrier capture coefficients can be determined. The model is then used to simulate current-voltage (IV) characteristics and the simulated IV-characteristics are found to be in good agreement with measured data over large ranges of currents (10 decades) and temperatures (150-420 K). The agreement verifies that the minority carrier capture coefficients are correct and makes it possible to calculate the charge carrier lifetime profiles of proton irradiated silicon. This is of great importance for simulations of proton irradiated devices, such as thyristors and power diodes. Copyright (C) 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd.