Temperature Dependence of Minority Carrier Lifetime in Epitaxially Grown p⁺-p^–-n⁺ 4H-SiC Drift Step Recovery Diodes

Abstract

In this paper we report on the effect of temperature and injection level on the effective lifetime of non-equilibrium charge carriers in p-base of 4H-SiC PiN diodes. Studies were carried out on 1kV drift step recovery diodes (DSRDs) with p+-p--n+. The lifetime of non-equilibrium charge carriers in 4H-SiC p+-p--n+ structures increases by an average of 6 times from 250ns to 1.4μs with the increase of the samples temperature from 300K to 673K. However, increase of the injection level in the drift region from 2.3·1016cm-3 to 5.9·1016cm-3 does not affect the lifetime indicating that Shockley-Read-Hall recombination processes are dominating.

High-Voltage Ultra-Fast Pulse Diode Stack Based on 4H-SiC

“…The single die DSRDs have mesa-diode geometry; their parameters and the details of fabrication are described in [3,4]. The measured lifetime of non-equilibrium charge carriers was 0.25µs at room temperature [4].…”

“…In [2,3] it has been experimentally established that silicon carbide based DSRDs can provide 2-4 times higher switching speed as compared to silicon devices and can handle switching current densities of up to 5•10 3 A/cm 2 . In [4] it has been shown that the 4H-SiC DSRDs as single dies are promising components for sub-nanosecond pulse generators for voltages of up to 2 kV. Higher operating voltages in the range of 5-10 kV could be achieved by fabricating single diodes with increased drift region thickness w = 60-120 µm, respectively.…”

Effect of Neutron Irradiation on Epitaxial 4H-SiC PiN UV-Photodiodes

“…Carrier lifetime measurements were carried out on the falling edge of the post-injection EMF using the open circuit voltage decay (OCVD) method as described in [9]. The effect of fast neutron irradiation on measured lifetimes is presented in Fig.…”

4H-SiC Drift Step Recovery Diode with Super Junction for Hard Recovery

“…In 2003 [ 10 ], I. V. Grekhov et al reported a SiC DSRD with an area of 2.2 × 10 −3 cm 2 , which can output a voltage with a rise time of about 4 ns and a pulse amplitude of 400 V. In 2012 [ 11 ], P. A. Ivanov et al fabricated devices with an area of 3.9 × 10 −3 cm 2 which can output a voltage with a rise time of 2 ns. In 2015 [ 12 ], A.V. Afanasyev et al reported that a SiC DSRD with a breakdown voltage of 1 kV and an active area of 1 × 10 −2 cm 2 , which can output a pulse voltage with an amplitude of 1125 V and a rise time of fewer than 2 ns.…”