Thermal-electronic circuits: Basics, simulations, experiments

Semiconductor devices are sensitive on temperature, and they produce a lot of heat because of the high power density. Therefore thermal effects have high importance in the operation of the semiconductor based microsystems. The thermal management has key importance in the microsystem construction, however thermal effects has been treated as parasitic phenomena until now. Recent research demonstrated that beside the electrical signal the thermal signal can also be treated as logic variable. In order to get closer to both the construction aspects and modeling questions of thermal-electronic devices lateral thin film semiconductor devices were constructed by laser ablation (vanadium dioxide, VO2) and cathode sputtering technology (Pt electrodes). The high temperature sensitivity of semiconductor-metal transition (SMT) semiconductor resulted in promising switching characteristics. A model was constructed and thermal-electric simulations were performed; the results are in good correlation with the measurements validating both the model and the explanation of the behavior.