PROCESS AND PHYSICS-BASED MESFET MODELS

COMPACT SOFTWARE PROPOSES TO DEVELOP PHYSICS-BASED MESFET, HEMT AND HBT MODELS AND THEN INTEGRATE THEM INTO OUR COMMERCIAL MICROWAVE NONLINEAR CIRCUIT SIMULATOR, "MICROWAVE HARMONICA." EXISTING EXTRACTION BASED MODELS SUCH AS THE MODIFIED MATERKA AND CURTICE MODELS ARE BASED ON MICROWAVE MEASUREMENT INFORMATION. THE USE OF PHYSICS OR PROCESS-BASED MODELS COMPLETES THE ANALYSIS CHAIN BY LINKINGPROCESS PARAMETER VARIATIONS TO DEVICE ELECTRICAL CHARACTERISTICS TO CIRCUIT PERFORMANCE AND YIELD. THIS ENABLES THE FOUNDRY PROCESS SENSITIVITIES TO BE UNDERSTOOD AND PROPERLY CORRELATED WITH THE CIRCUIT PERFORMANCE AND YIELD. SUCH INFORMATION CAN BE USED TO IMPROVE CIRCUIT YIELD FOR A GIVEN PROCESS (I.E., DESENSITIZE THE CIRCUIT DESIGN TO A GIVEN FOUNDRY PROCESS) OR TO IDENTIFY CERTAIN PROCESS PARAMETERS WITH A VIEW TOWARD IMPROVING THESE SELECTED PROCESSES AND THEREBY INCREASE THE CIRCUIT YIELD. IN ADDITION, AN ACCURATE PHYSICS-BASED MODEL WILL PERMIT MODELING AND PERFORMANCE PREDICTION OF MM-WAVE DEVICES PRIOR TO FABRICATION. THE PROPOSED PHASE I WORK WILL INVESTIGATE THE OPTIMUM INTERFACE AND VALIDITY OF A SMALL SIGNAL CLOSED-FORM MESFET MODEL WITHINMICROWAVE HARMONICA. THE PHASE II WORK WILL EXTEND THIS INITIAL INVESTIGATION INTO THE FOLLOWING AREAS: 1) LARGE SIGNAL MESFET MODELS, 2)LARGE AND SMALL SIGNAL HEMT MODELS, 3) LARGE AND SMALL SIGNAL HBT MODELS. ANTICIPATED BENEFITS/POTENTIAL COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS - THE ANTICIPATED BENEFITS OF THIS EFFORT ARE AS FOLLOWS: 1) THE INTEGRATION OF PHYSICS-BASED MESFET, HEMT AND HBT MODELS INTO AN EXISTING MICROWAVE COMMERCIAL NONLINEAR SIMULATOR, MICROWAVE HARMONICA; 2) ANALYSIS OF THE LINKAGE BETWEEN PROCESS PARAMETERS TO DEVICE CHARACTERISTICS TO CIRCUIT PERFORMANCE AND YIELD; 3) A DETAILED "CASE STUDY" OF A PRODUCTION MMIC CIRCUIT; 4) ESTABLISHMENT OF CLOSER TIES BETWEEN COMMERCIAL SIMULATORS AND PHYSICS-BASED MESFET/HEMT/HBT MODELLING EFFORTS. IN PARTICULAR, IN PHASE II,