Electrical noise used as a tool for assessing the defectivity of SiC Schottky diodes

We report the observation of random telegraph signals (RTS) occurring in the forward regime of silicon carbide Schottky diodes. RTS noise is attributed to the modulation of the conductivity either by the trapping/detrapping of a single electron or by the switching of a bistable defect, in the neighbourhood of a localized current path. Noise measurement is therefore a convenient and non-destructive method for assessing the defectivity of SiC power diodes.