Formation of multiple current filaments and the effect of filament confinement in silicon based PIN diodes

Electrostatic discharge (ESD) can be considered as one of the main reliability risks of modern electronic systems which causes failure of semiconductor devices by an over-current effect. One of the dominant failure mechanisms during an ESD event is thermal runaway caused by an avalanche breakdown leading to an inhomogeneous current flow and a current filament. Here, the formation and motion of current filaments are investigated on special test structures of silicon based PIN diodes using technology computer-aided design (TCAD) simulations and transmission line pulse (TLP) measurements. In thin structures a constriction of the filament occurs as well as the formation of multiple filaments is observed.