New DDSCR structure with high holding voltage for robust ESD applications

A novel dual direction silicon-controlled rectifier(DDSCR)with an additional P-type doping and gate(APGDDSCR)is proposed and demonstrated.Compared with the conventional low-voltage trigger DDSCR(LVTDDSCR)that has positive and negative holding voltages of 13.371 V and 14.038 V,respectively,the new DDSCR has high positive and negative holding voltages of 18.781 V and 18.912 V in a single finger device,respectively,and it exhibits suitable enough positive and negative holding voltages of 14.60 V and 14.319 V in a four-finger device for±12-V application.The failure current of APGDDSCR is almost the same as that of LVT-DDSCR in the single finger device,and the four-finger APGDDSCR can achieve positive and negative human-body model(HBM)protection capabilities of 22.281 kV and 23.45 kV,respectively,under 40-V voltage of core circuit failure,benefitting from the additional structure.The new structure can generate a snapback voltage on gate A to increase the current gain of the parasitic PNP in holding voltage.Thus,a sufficiently high holding voltage increased by the structure can ensure that a multi-finger device can also reach a sufficient holding voltage,it is equivalent to solving the non-uniform triggering problem of multi-finger device.The operating mechanism and the gate voltage are both discussed and verified in two-dimensional(2D)simulation and experiemnt.