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Ultra-Thin gate Oxide Breakdown: A Failure that we can live with?
Published
Author(s)
John S. Suehle
Abstract
As gate oxides are scaled down in thickness in current technologies, the breakdown event caused by TDDB becomes 'softer'. In current technologies where the oxide thickness is less than 2 nm, the breakdown event has become so soft that in some cases circuit functionality is not significantly affected. In fact, IC manufacturers can extend chip reliability by allowing multiple gate oxide breakdown events to occur before considering the life of the chip is over.