Simulation of self-heating and contact resistance influences on nMOSFETs

The lattice heat equation and the Schottky contact model were implemented in a device simulator to evaluate the influences of self-heating on inversion layer mobility μ_inv and contact resistance R_co in scaled-down nMOSFETs. It is shown that the self-heating degrades μ_inv and reduces R_co of source/drain silicide. As ambient temperature T_amb increases, the degradation of μ_inv becomes more pronounced, because of the different contribution of the temperature dependence of the phonon scattering in the μ_inv model. Conversely, the reduction of R_co by self-heating becomes more pronounced as T _amb decreases