Investigation of Temperature and Flux Effects on Heavy Ion Induced Degradation in SiC Schottky Diode

In this work, the effects of environmental temperature and ion flux on heavy-ion irradiation damage in commercial SiC Schottky diodes were experimentally characterized. The result shows that the room temperature (25 degrees C) irradiation is the worst setting than high temperatures. In particular, the reverse leakage current IR increment at the highest temperature (150 degrees C) is about one-fifth of that at room temperature. The damage is more serious under high flux irradiation, and the IR increment introduced by higher flux (-10,000 ions/(cm2 center dot s)) is four times larger than that by lower flux (-300 ions/(cm2 center dot s)). After room temperature annealing for more than one year, the DUTs still show the same damage characteristics, which indicates the degradation damage induced by heavy ions is permanent. The variation of power dissipation induced by the synergistic effect of heavy ion incident and the electric field is the root mechanism. The results would help estimate the feasibility of the usage of SiC power devices in space.