Transient analysis of ESD protection elements by time domain transmission using repetitive pulses

This paper describes a test method which allows the investigation of the transient switching behavior of ESD-protection elements with very high transient resolution within the first nanoseconds. It is based on time domain transmission (TDT) measurements using a repetitive pulser. By means of this method the turn on behavior of forward biased diodes was investigated and compared with single shot TLP data and device simulation. Furthermore the dV/dt-triggering of a protection transistor was analyzed