Programming mode dependent degradation of tunnel oxide floating gate devices

The degradation of floating gate EEPROM devices is studied by measurements directly on the memory devices. An important tool for the characterization of the degradation behaviour is the charge pumping technique, which is used to determine the interface state generation and the trapped charges in the memory cell. Different degradation behaviours, dependent on the programming mode are explained and qualitatively simulated. A measurement procedure allowing to perform subsequent degradation measurements on the same device is introduced. The effect of the programming conditions on the resulting degradation is shown.