Spectroscopic observations of photon emissions in n-MOSFETs in the saturation region

Abstract

Direct spectrally resolved observations were made of the photon emissions n-channel MOSFETs biased in the saturation region. It was found that the total photon emission intensity measured in the range 1.45-2.75 eV is proportional to the substrate current and the correlation is independent of the bias condition, channel current and channel length. However, it was also found that the relationship between emission intensity at the low end of the range of energies varied with /0.7 sub whereas the emission intensity at the high end of the energy range varied with /1.5 sub. From these observations, it was concluded that Bremsstrahlung radiation of hot electrons in the Coulombic field is unlikely to be the dominant mechanism of photon emission in n-channel MOSFETs.