MICROELECTRONICS

RELIABILITY

PERGAMON Microelectronics Reliability 39 (1999) 879-884

www.elsevier.com/locate/microrel

Extraction and evolution of Fowler-Nordheim tunneling parameters of

thin gate oxides under EEPROM-like dynamic degradation

S. Croci a, J.M. Voisin a, C. Plossu ~, C. Raynaud a, J.L. Autran ",

P. Boivin b, J.M. Mirabel b
a LPM, UMR CNRS 5511, INSA de Lyon, Bat. 502, F-69621 Villeurbanne Cedex, France
b STMicroelectronics, BP 2, F-13106 Rousset Cedex, France

Abstract

A new method is presented for the extraction of the Fowler-Nordheim (FN) tunneling parameters of thin gate
oxides from experimental current-voltage characteristics of Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor (MOS) capacitors. In
this technique, the classical low temperature FN current model is considered but an improved numerical
procedure has been implemented for the calculation of the oxide electric field - gate voltage relationship. It is
shown that this iterative method leads to an excellent fit of experimental data with theoretical curves for both p-
type and n-type substrates, even in the case of high doping levels. The procedure allows the determination of
both FN tunneling parameters and potential barrier heights at silicon and polysilicon interfaces with a systematic
estimation of the statistical fitting errors on each parameter. It is applied here to the study of the variations of the
FN tunneling parameters of thin oxides submitted to EEPROM-Iike dynamic degradation. © 1999 Elsevier
Science Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Writing and erasing operations of electrically-
erasable read-only memories (EEPROMs) are based
on the mechanism of Fowler-Nordheim (FN)
tunneling injection through a thin oxide window.
This charge injection modifies the electrical charge
stored on the floating-gate of the cell state transistor.
When considering cell programming functions, the
FN current (In) must be accurately controlled. For
oxides thicker than 6 nm [1], the FN current is well
modeled using the Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin
(WKB) approximation and is expressed as a function
of the oxide electric field (Eox) by the classical
expression [2] :
IFN =SAE2xexp(---~-B) (1)
tEoxJ
where S is the injection window area, A and B are
the two tunneling parameters, depending on the
effective electron mass m in SiO2, and on the energy
barrier height ~boat the injected interface :
A m0 q3
= (2)
m* 8rth%
[ , ~1/2
B 8 ~ | 2 m / ~b03/2
(3)
mo is the electron mass, q is the electronic charge, h
is the Planck constant.
A and B parameters are classically determined by
the plot of ln(IFN/(SEoxZ)) versus 1/Eox (called FN
plot) which must be linear according to Eq. (1) [2-7].
Values of IFN are directly obtained from experimental
data while values of Eox are more difficult to be
precisely estimated. The following expression of Eox
as a function of the gate voltage VG may be used :
Eox _ VG -(VFB +(~s +~bp) (4)
tox
where V ~ is the flatband voltage of the Metal-
Oxide-Semiconductor (MOS) structure, tox is the
oxide thickness, and ~ and ~sp are respectively the
silicon and polysilicon surface potentials (we neglect

0026-2714/99/$ - see front matter. © 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
PII: S0026-2714(99)00117-1
880 S, Croci et al. /Microelectronics Reliability 39 (1999) 879-884
here the contribution of the interface states).
In numerous works, VF~I, 4is and 4~sp are neglected
in Eq. (4) or are preliminary determined from the
capacitance-voltage data of the structure under test.
But for very thin gate oxides and high substrate
doping levels, these quantities are difficult to be
separately evaluated, due to the physical limitation in
reaching the inversion regime of such highly doped
substrates and due to a possible depletion
phenomenon in the polysilicon gate. In another way,
if a theoretical calculation of qbs and Os p is attempted
in order to determine the Eox (Vo) relationship, the
main encountered difficulty is the precise theoretical
calculation of oxide and polysilicon energy bandgap
structures because of their amorphous and
polycrystalline nature respectively [8].
Now, we briefly discuss the theoretical validity of
formulas (1-3) which have been established using the
classical model in which the electrons (holes) at the
semiconductor or polysilicon surface are treated as a
three-dimensional gas of free particles with an energy
distribution described by the Boltzmann's statistic.
This model is able to correctly describe the FN
injection only at low injection levels [2, 4]. Indeed,
this classical treatment is not correct because a part
(or the totality) of the electrons (holes) are confined
into a narrow potential well at the oxide interface,
both in inversion and accumulation modes. Therefore
carriers behave as a two-dimensional quantum-
mechanical (Q-M) gas [9] in which the electron
energy levels at the cathod interface are quantified
and depend on the shape of the potential well.
Therefore the potential barrier height 410 at the
injecting interface depends on the oxide electric field
Eo~. For this reason a Q-M description should be used
[8-16], in particular to extract pertinent values of dp0
and in this latter case, the formulas (1-3) can again be
used and the linearity of the FN plot is obtained if a
field-dependent barrier height is considered [8, 12,
14-16]. It follows that the constant barrier height
value usually deduced from the slope of the FN plot
is not correct (see for example [2-7]) and if this latter
value is inserted in Eqs. (1-3), it is impossible to
obtain a good fit of the experimental tunneling
current-voltage characteristics [8-14]. The only way
to correctly fit the I-V plot with the insertion of a
constant barrier height in Eqs. (1-3) is to use a
suitable effective barrier height (~0)~ef which is only
considered as a fitting parameter [17]. It is important
to note that this quantity does not have any physical
meaning and any link with the 4~ovalue obtained from
the slope of the FN plot : it is only an internal
calculation variable.
In this work, we have investigated an alternative
way to obtain accurate values of the Eox(Vc)
relationship and then a correct FN plot via an
iterative algorithm using a constant effective barrier
height. This fitting method leads to very good fits of
FN current-voltage curves. Moreover, the great
advantage of this method is that it does not require
the knowledge of V~, ells and illsP.
2. The method
In our method, the (constant) barrier height (410)eel
is expressed as a function of the two tunneling
parameters from Eqs. (2-3) :
m0 q3 1
I~0(A)eff = ~ - - (5)
m 8~h A
41°(B)eff : l - ~ t ~ J (6)
where the effective electron mass in SiO2 is assumed
to be m*= 0.5xmo as reported by Weinberg [7,1 8].
In Eqs. (2-3), (410) is univocally defined and
therefore the values of 410(A)af and Ill0(B)¢ffobtained
from Eqs. (5-6) must be strictly equal. If these two
values are different, it means that the estimation of
the Eox(V~) relationship is not correct. So, it is
possible to use the equation 41o(A)eff = 41o(B)eef as a
numerical way to determine the unknown term
(VFB+41s+41sp) in Eq. (4), as explained below and
illustrated in Figs. 1 and 2.
In our algorithm, the quantity (VFB+41s+41sp) is put
equal to a global constant K. Eox is now
approximated both in inversion and accumulation
regimes [19] by the simplified relation :
Eo x = V G - K (7)
tox
In the first step, K is put equal to 0 and the value
of A, B and of their fitting error, obtained from the
least square regression of the linear FN plot are
estimated with the use of Eq. (7). From these values,
¢0(A)~ff, ¢o(B)af and the numerical errors on these
quantities (respectively named e(410(A)~ff ) and
e(410(B)eef)) can be evaluated.
As illustrated in Fig.l, on the intersection domain
defined by :
 S. Croci et al. / Microelectronics Reliability 39 (1999) 879-884
((4)o)~a) (%(B))~
.. ~"'.... . . . . .,.-."'"
""''".... '"'"'"'"'... 4 ......."
((%)o,)~,~ _ ......... 2:.. "'i..-~:: .....
((%)otf)~n - - - - ~
Kmin
]
Kmax
Figure 1. Principle of the research of the (~)af and K
constants. The straight lines represent ¢o(A)~ffand ~(B)~ff,
as calculated from Eqs.(5) and (6), with A and B obtained
from the regression of FN plot for any K value. The dotted
lines correspond to ~(A)eff and ~(B)eff plus or minus their
respective error for every K. The points labeled 1, 2, 3, and
4 respectively correspond to K and (~)~ff values for which
the Eqs. (9a-9d) are verified.
[¢o(A)eff -I- E((~o(A)eff)]t~ [(~o(B )eff -I- E(0do(B )eff)]
we calculate the values of (Co)at and K for which the
following conditions are verified :
[¢o(A)off+ e(¢o(A),ff)] = [¢o(B),ff- e(¢o(B)af)]
[~)o(A)eff- e(%(A)¢ff)] = [¢o(B)af- e(~)o(B)af)]
[(1)o(A)cff-e((I)o(A)af)] = [¢o(B)eff+ e(%(B)eff)]
[~o(A)cff +E(~0(A)eff)] = [~o(B)eff+ E(Op0(B)eff)]
These estimations are made within a given error,
named 5. The (~0)eff value is assumed equal to the
mean between the maximum and the minimum value
obtained from Eqs.(9a-9d), while a((¢0)eff) is
considered equal to the difference between the
maximum value and the found mean (~0)af. As it is
evident from Fig. 1, the (¢0)af error is lightly
overestimated.
In the same manner, the value of K is assumed
equal to the mean between the maximum and the
minimum K values (respectively Km~x and Kmi,)
which correspond to the obtained (~0)¢ff from Eqs.
(9a-9d), while the K error is defined as the difference
between Kmaxand the found mean K.
Finally, A and B parameters from which ((~0)eff
has been calculated and their errors are taken as the
good values. The best fit of FN plot is then obtained
by inserting values of A, B and K into Eqs. (1) and
(7) respectively.
881
(0o(A))af Experimental data I-V ]
K=0;
. ............ I Extraction of A, B I
0
Extraction of ~0(A)eff
"%, ~.
K I and ¢0(B )eff I °
no r,,.)
Final values of [
(8) K, A, B, (00)elf
Figure 2. Algorithm for the determination of the FN
tunneling parameters (A and B), of the effective potential
barrier height (~)~ff and of the K constant.
(90
If the conditions (Eqs. 9) are not verified, a
(9b) second step is developed in which K is changed (such
as K¢=0) and Eox is recalculated (see Fig. 2). Now the
ln(I~/(SEox2)) versus 1/Eox is again plotted with this
(9c) new Eox and the first step is again developed for this
new value of K. The value of K is increased or
(9d) decreased until Eqs. (9) are verified.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Device fabrication
The devices used in this study are p-type and n ÷-
type silicon MOS capacitors fabricated by
STMicroelectronics (Rousset) using a standard
EEPROM technology with thermal or nitrided gate
oxide. The main technological parameters of the
samples are summarized in Table 1.
The reference thermal oxide was grown in O2/H2
followed by an annealing in nitrogen at 1000 °C
during 10 minutes. The nitrided oxide was thermally
grown in a conventional furnace in three steps : i)
initial oxidation in O2/1-I2 ambient ; ii) oxidation and
nitridation in pure N20 at 900 °C ; iii) annealing in
pure N2 at 1000 °C for ten minutes. The different step
durations have been adjusted in order to obtain the
same oxide thickness for the different MOS devices
882 S. Croci et al. /Microelectronics Reliability 39 (1999) 879-884

Table 1 10-s • , . j • , • , • ,

Technological and geometrical parameters of the MOS • Dato ] _...."

capacitors used in this study. ~" 10-7 The°ry ~ ~ ~ 4 d ~
Samples n+-type Si(100) p-type Si(100)
Doping level (cm"3) -2×1019 -5x1016 . ~ 1 0 -9
Gate P-doped (N÷) P-doped (N÷)
10"11
Oxide thickness (nm) 7.30 7.35
Gate area (cmz) 2.25x10 3 1.98x10-2
10la
I l i • I B
studied. The presence of nitrogen in the nitrided i I i ~I/ i I i I i 1--
a

oxide was confirmed by Secondary Ion Mass 10152 3 4 5 6 7

Spectrometry (the dose was too low to be quantified G a t e v o l t a g e (V)
1°-5 •
with precision). The n ÷ polysilicon gate layer was
deposited by the standard chemical vapour deposition
process (CVD) and doped with phosphorus. Then, a
WSiz layer was deposited by CVD from a SiH4/WF6
mixture. 1 0 .8

3.2. Experimental verification ~ 10.1~

The previously described method has been 10 -13 /

applied for the two kinds of oxide and for the two
kinds of substrate type. As shown in Figs. 3 and 4, a 1 0 "15 , I , I , r~l , I i I

very good agreement between the experimental and -2 -3 -4 -5 -6 -7

G a t e v o l t a g e (V)
simulated current-voltage curves either in inversion
or in accumulation mode is obtained. The theoretical Figure 3. Experimental and simulated current-voltage
curves have been calculated with our iterative characteristics in accumulation (a) and in inversion (b)
regimes for a n+-type nitrided sample.
Table 2.
K and (~)af calculated in accumulation mode for p-type algorithm and the corresponding values of (CO)elfand
and n*-type substrates and for nitrided and thermal oxides. K are reported in Tables 2 and 3, respectively for the
The injecting electrode is also reported. accumulation and inversion regimes of the Si
substrate. The nature of the injecting electrode is also
Samples K (V) (~)cff(eV) Injecting reported. From these results, it is evident that the
electrode (~0)~ff at the Si/SiO2 interface weakly depends on the
n+ thermal -0,26 3,09 Si substrate type but strongly depends on the nature of
n+ nitrided -0,3 3,12 Si the injecting electrode (silicon or polysilicon gate).
p thermal -1,17 2,88 Poly-Si gate Moreover the (q0)eff value is higher for the Si/SiO2
p nitrided -1,19 2,83 Poly-Si gate interface than for the polysilicon/SiO2 one.
In Figs. 3a and 3b are plotted the experimental
Table 3. and simulated current-voltage curves for both
K and (¢0)~ucalculated in inversion mode for p-type and n+ injection polarities on a virgin n÷-nitrided capacitor,
-type substrates and for nitrided and thermal oxides. while in figures 4a and 4b are plotted similar curves
for a p-nitrided device. Note that for the p-type
Samples K (V) (Co)off(eV) Injecting structure in inversion mode, the current is limited by
electrode the substrate minority carrier density (measurements
n÷ thermal -1.32 2,91 Poly-Si gate have been performed in the dark).
n÷ nitrided -0,99 2,75 Poly-Si gate
p thermal 0,43 3,09 Si 3.3. Monitoring of EEPROM-like degradation
p nitrided 0,53 3 Si
In this paragraph, we evaluate the proposed
extraction method to follow the evolution of the
 S. Croci et al. / Microelectronics Reliability 39 (1999) 879-884 883

1E-5 . , . , - , - , - i EEPROM cells, are applied on the capacitor gate.

' • Data
The details of the technique and of the experimental
,s-,.1. Theory [ setup are described in Ref. [20]. Fig. 5 shows the
results obtained on a n÷-thermal capacitor submitted
1E-9 up to 300 kcycles of degradation. We observe a slight
and constant increase of the barrier height (and a
+~ IE-11 decrease of K) when increasing the number of cycles.
In fact, such a behavior should be due to the
1E-13 generation of an oxide charge and to the resulting
a change in the barrier shape which results, in the
lS-15 • [ • ~ , i - i approximated model used, in an apparent variation of
3 4 5 6 7
(~0)af. We point out here the necessity to use a more
Gate voltage (V) complete description of the FN conduction in the
1E-5 case of significant degradation of thin oxides.
"m Data' . . . . '~,
,E-7 Theory J 3.4. Comparison between different methods

IE-9 As indicated above, (¢0)eff values have been

extracted assuming a constant barrier in Eqs. (2-3)
1E-11 and using a fit procedure based on Eq. (1). The aim
of this paragraph is to compare different approaches
1E-13 for the extraction of (¢0)~ff. In Table 4 are reported
the (¢0)af values for n÷-thermal samples, both in
IE-15 , . , . , •. r , . , . , accumulation and inversion regimes, as extracted by
-2 -3 -4 o5 -6 -7
using the following assumptions : 1) the electrons in
Gate voltage (V) Si are treated as a 3-dimensional gas governed by the
Figure 4. Experimental and simulated current-voltage Boltzmann's statistic ; 2) the Q-M theory is used to
characteristics in inversion (a) and in accumulation (b) determine the oxide field but the barrier height is
regimes for a p-type nitrided sample. assumed constant ; 3) our algorithm is used as the
fitting method.

Table 4.
Comparison between different (00)effextraction methods, as
introduced in the text.

3.00 ~.\ /r~\ * 100 (~)eff (eV) (~)eff (eV)

200 Method Si/SiO2interface poly-SffSiO2 interface
2.95 O0 1 2.9 2.86
2 3.05 2.9
3 3.09 2.91
2.85J , - , - , • , • , • ,
-0.6 -0.5 -0.4 -0.3 -0.2 -0.1
K (V) Fig. 6 shows the fitting curves obtained with our
algorithm and with the Q-M method for n+-thermal
Figure 5. Evolution of the effective barrier height at the samples : we evidence here that the fit performed
polySi/SiO2 interface and of the K constant after nc with our algorithm is better than the second method
degradation cycles, as extracted with the iterative algorithm
and accurately reproduces the I-V curves both at low
on a n+-thermal capacitor. The (~)eff and K error domains
are also represented. and high voltage values.
Finally, in order to improve the Q-M method, we
barrier heights at both silicon and polysilicon considered a field dependent barrier height as
injecting interfaces during EEPROM-like dynamic predicted by the Q-M theory, in particular a linear
degradation. During this stress, bipolar high voltage decrease of ¢0 with Eox [12,14] and a more complex
pulses, similar to those used in the programming of dependence [15,16] where ~0(Eox)=ao-alEoxlt2-a2Eoxu3
884 S. Croci et al. /Microelectronics Reliability 39 (1999) 879-884

1E-5

4. Conclusion
I E -7 •

,..q
1E-9.

IE41;

1E-13.

1E-15
?

•
uRn,
II

3
u.l
I |

4
II
, • .
•

5
, nip
I~

Gate voltage (V)

f ,

6
. ,

7
.

8
,
a
.
In summary, we have proposed a new method for
the extraction of the FN tunneling parameters of thin
gate oxide MOS capacitors. We have shown that this
method leads to a very accurate fit of the FN
characteristic for p-type and n+-type substrates, both
in accumulation and in inversion regimes. The main
important points of this iterative algorithm are : i) its
capability to be use for very high substrate doping
concentrations ; ii) its range of validity including low
and high voltage domains of the FN plot ; iii) its
~E-S
robustness and its easy computer implementation•

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~ 1E-9
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