Characterization of AC Hot-Carrier Effects in Poly-Si Thin-Film Transistors

In this paper, we employed a new test structure to characterize the alternating-current (AC) hot-carrier (HC)-induced degradation in poly-Si thin-film transistors. High sensitivity in detecting the damage and the capability of directly resolving the damage location are demonstrated due to the unique feature of the test structure. Our results indicate that the major degradation is induced in the turn-off stages of the AC-stress signal when applied to the gate and in the turn-on stages of the AC-stress signal when applied to the drain. The availability and energy relaxation of channel HCs are considered to explain the experimental findings.