METHOD FOR CHANGING OVER SWITCH-TYPE HIGH-VOLTAGE SEMICONDUCTOR STRUCTURES (OPTIONS) Russian patent published in 1998 - IPC

FIELD: semiconductor engineering. SUBSTANCE: method involves supplying control pulse of same polarity as operating voltage to semiconductor structure before its change-over moment; rate of rise of control pulse meets expression dU/dt > 2E∂W/τ_s, where E_o is characteristic field of semiconductor silicon structure equal to 10⁵ V/cm; W is thickness of high-resistance layer of semiconductor structure characterized by level of doping with acceptor or donor impurities N_a or N_d, respectively, , each not in excess of 10¹⁵ cm^-3. Layer thickness W is not over 0.2 cm; τ_s is transit time of mobile charge carriers through high- resistance layer of W thickness equal to τ_s= W/V_s, where V_s is saturated carrier drift velocity in semiconductor structure. In optional version, control pulse of polarity reverse to that of operating voltage is applied to semiconductor structure before its change-over moment; rate of rise of control pulse meets here expression dU/dt > 4E∂W/τ_s, where E_o is characteristic field of semiconductor silicon structure equal to 10⁵ V/cm; W is thickness of high-resistance layer of semiconductor structure characterized by level of doping with acceptor or donor impurities, respectively, each not in excess of 10¹⁵ cm^-3. Layer thickness W is not over 0.2 cm; τ_s is transit time of mobile charge carriers through high-resistance layer of W thickness equal to τ_s= W/V_s,, where V_s is carrier saturated drift velocity in semiconductor structure. EFFECT: improved speed and efficiency of switching semiconductor structures due to reduced switching and residual loss; increased currents and voltages handled. 2 cl, 7 dwg