Reliability Assessment of Production of SiC
MESFET’s
A.
Ward, S.T. Allen, and J. Palmour,
Cree, Inc.,
4600 Silicon Dr., Durham, NC 27703,
email: Allan_Ward@cree.com, Phone:
Testing was performed to assess the wear-out reliability and robustness of production SiC MESFETs. Parametric failures ultimately occurred due to Ti/Pt/Au interconnect degradation after 730 hours at a junction temperature of 410oC. However, no degradation was observed in the properties of the SiC semiconductor itself, nor in the gate and ohmic interface to SiC, demonstrating the suitability of technology for applications that require high reliability at both standard and elevated operating temperatures. Accelerated life test data using production SiC MESFETs indicates MTTF=2.0 x 106 hours at a junction temperature of 175oC.
Keywords: SiC, MESFET, MMIC, Reliability, Broadband