Communications in Applied and Industrial Mathematics,

ISSN 2038-0909, 1, 1, (2010) 110127

DOI: 10.1685/2010CAIM482

Modeling thermal effects in submicron

semiconductor devices
Vincenza Di Stefano
Dipartimento di Matematica e Informatica, Facolt`
a di Scienze MM.FF.NN.
Universit`
a degli Studi di Catania, Italy
vdistefano@dmi.unict.it
Communicated by Roberto Natalini

Abstract
In this paper an Extended Hydrodynamic Model for the coupled system formed by
electrons and phonons has been formulated, in which the problem of the closure for the
high-order moments is solved by means of the Maximum Entropy Principle of extended
thermodynamics. Simulation results for a 1D n+ n n+ silicon diode are presented.
Keywords:
Semiconductor devices, hydrodynamic models, maximum entropy
principle, self-heating.
AMS Subject Classification: 65C05, 82D37

1. Introduction.
The technological revolution that started with the introduction of the
transistor just over half a century ago is without parallel in the way it
has shaped our economy and our daily lives. The current trend toward
nanoscale electronics is expected to have a similar impact into the third
millennium. Commercial integrated circuits are currently available with
transistors whose smallest lateral feature size is less than 100 nm and the
thinnest material films are below 2 nm, or only a few atomic layers thick.
Such miniaturization has led to tremendous integration levels, with a hundred million transistors assembled together on a chip area no larger than
a few square centimeters. Due to this nanometric scale, large electric fields
and field gradients are produced inside the material, which generate a very
large quantity of heat as well as hot or energetic electrons, that will prevent
the reliable operation of the integrated circuits. Overheating is one of the
most common causes of device failure; the efficient removal of heat from
such submicron devices is a daunting task.
The heat conduction in crystalline materials is related to the lattice vibrations. According to quantum mechanics, these oscillations are quantized

Received 2010 01 20, in final form 2010 06 12

Published 2010 06 21
Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial No Derivatives

DOI: 10.1685/2010CAIM482

and the associated particle is called phonon. Phonons travel through space
and engage anharmonic interactions with one another, and with electrons,
impurities and geometric boundaries. These interactions are called scatterings.
The transport mechanism starts by applying an external bias voltage. The
electrons are accelerated by the self consistent and external electric field,
thanks to which they gain energy. This energy is lost by inelastical scattering with geometric boundaries and phonons, heating up the lattice through
the mechanism known as Joule heating. If the characteristic size of a solid
material is much larger than the mean free path of the resident phonons,
which is approximately 300 400 nm in bulk silicon at room temperature, then the number of scattering events is large. Moreover, if there are
small temperature gradients, the local thermodynamic equilibrium is restored. This regime (diffusion-like) can be described accurately using the
non-isothermal drift-diffusion model, in which the classical drift-diffusion
equations are coupled with the Fourier law of heat conduction, via a heat
generation rate term [1]:
(1)

H = J E + (R G)(EG + 3kB T ) .

In the previous equation, the dot product of the electric field E and the
current density J represents the Joule heating and the second right-handside term represents the heating rate due to the generation-recombination
processes. With continued scaling into the nanometric scale, this nonisothermal drift diffusion model is no more valid because, as said, high
electric field and high field-gradient conditions in the active region of the
device (whose length is of the order of 10 100 nm), drive the system out
of local thermal equilibrium. Moreover, in spite of the small electron mean
free path (approximately 5 10 nm in bulk silicon at room temperature),
a small amount of hot electrons, which belong to the tail of the electron
distribution function, can travel in the device without losing appreciable
energy (in a ballistic regime). In this picture, degradation effects, substrate
current, injection into the gate oxide regions, impact ionization and lattice
heating are produced. Consequently, the commercial TCAD tools, based
on the drift-diffusion equations, are not able to describe accurately these
regimes; for this reason other transport models are needed.
The most complete description of a system formed by electrons and
phonons, is based on the Bloch-Boltzmann-Peierls (BBP), coupled with
the Poisson equation. To solve the BBP is not an easy task also from the
numerical point of view. The Monte Carlo solution of the BBP has been
recently achieved [2], at expenses of extensive computational times. For this
reason, it is important to have alternative models which are sufficiently ac-

111

V. Di Stefano

curate, and with a lower computational cost.

The hydrodynamic models represent a good tool to simulate submicron
devices. The main problems to tackle are the closure for the high-order
moments as well as the closure of the production terms (i.e. the moments
on the collisional operator). A simple coupled thermal and electrical model
has been developed [3], consisting of the hydrodynamic equations for the
electron transport and energy conservation equations for different phonon
modes. The hydrodynamic model for the electrons was closed by using the
Fourier law for the electron heat flow. It is well known that the Fourier law
is not the best way to get a closed form [4], because it greatly overestimates
the heat current near the channel-drain junction of the device.
An alternative is to formulate a hydrodynamic model by means of the Maximum Entropy Principle (hereafter MEP) of extended thermodynamics [5].
In Sec. 2 we introduce the kinetic equations for electrons and phonons. In
Sec. 3 we write the moment equations and in Sec. 4 we deal with the MEP
and the closure relations for the fluxes. An Extended Hydrodynamic Model
(EHM) is formulated in Sec. 5. Finally in Sec. 6 this model is used to simulate a 1D n+ n n+ silicon diode and conclusions are drawn in Sec.
7.
2. Kinetic equations
The non-equilibrium behaviour of the system formed by the electrons
and phonons is described by a system of coupled Boltzmann equations,
called Bloch-Boltzmann-Peierls (BBP) equations. In principle the interactions in such a system are phonon-phonon (p-p), phonon-electron (p-e) and
electron-electron (e-e). In the sequel, we shall consider the electrons as a
rarefied gas in a sea of phonons, which means that the e-e interactions can
be neglected. In e-p interactions only the electrons number and energy are
conserved. In p-p interactions only energy is conserved. Let f (t, x, k) be the
probability density to find an electron at time t, position x = (x1 , x2 , x3 ),
with wave vector k=(k1 , k2 , k3 ) and energy (k), Ng = Ng (t, x, q) the probability density to find a phonon at time t, position x with wave vector
q=(q1 , q2 , q3 ) and energy ~g (q) of type g (i.e. the branch g of the phonon
spectrum). The BBP equations read [6]
(2)
(3)

X
f
e
+ v(k) x f E k f =
Qep
g [f, Ng ]
t
~
g

Ng
pp
+ ug (q) x Ng = Qpe
g [f, Ng ] + Qg [Ng ] ,
t

g = {g1 , g2 , g3 , ...}

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DOI: 10.1685/2010CAIM482

where e is the absolute value of the electron charge, ~ the Planck constant divided by 2, v=(v1 , v2 , v3 ) and ug =(u1 , u2 , u3 ) are the electron and
phonon group velocities
(4)

v(k) =

1
k ,
~

ug (q) = q g

Scattering processes due to the electron-phonon interaction are modeled

pe
by the collisional operators Qep
g [f, Ng ], Qg [f, Ng ], whereas the phononphonon collision operator is Qpp
g [Ng ]. The electric field E(t, x) (E1 , E2 , E3 )
satisfies the Poisson equation
() = e [n(t, x) ND (x) + NA (x)]
(5)

E = x

where n(t, x) is the electron density, (t, x) is the electric potential, ND and
NA are the donor and acceptor densities respectively, the permittivity.
We treat the electrons in the parabolic band approximation, in which the
dispersion relation is given by
(6)

(k) =

~2 k2
2m

where m denotes the effective electron mass, which is 0.32 me in silicon.

Then we apply the Debey approximation with the sound velocity vs to the
acoustic phonon system and use the Einstein dispersion relation for the
optical phonons, as given in the following formulas:
(7)

ac (q) = vs |q|

(8)

op (q) = const.

The collisional operator e-p, in the low density approximation (not degenerate case), writes:
Z


V
ep
(9)
Qg [f, Ng ] = 3 dk w(k , k)f (k ) w(k, k )f (k)
8

where V is the crystal volume, and w(k , k) is the scattering rate e-p which,
according to the Fermi rule, writes


X


1 1
(10)w(k, k ) =
s(q) Ng (q) +
k ,kq (k ) (k) ~(q) .
2 2
q

113

V. Di Stefano

s(q) is the scattering function, is the Diracs Delta, the upper and lower
signs refer to phonon absorption or emission processes respectively. The
scattering function for acoustic phonons is given by
(11)

sac (q) =

2 |q|
DA
vs V

where DA is the electron acoustic-phonon deformation potential (9 eV),

the silicon density (2.33 g/cm3 ). For optical phonons is:
(12)

sop (q) =

D2 Z
V

where the coupling constants are given in [7]. The collisional operator p-e
is
X



Qpe
s(q)f (k) [Ng (q) + 1] k ,kq (k ) (k) + ~(q)
g [f, Ng ] = 2
k,k

(13)



Ng (q)k ,k+q (k ) (k) ~(q)

The physics of the phonon-phonon scattering is very complicated. Optical

phonons do not readily migrate to the surface, as their non-dispersive nature near the zone center gives them a very low group velocity, and they
do not carry very much heat [8]. According to the scattering theory, optical
phonons decay mostly into two acoustic phonons. Of this process is known
the experimental relaxation time op (4 20 ps) which is known from
Raman spectroscopy [9]; consequently this process will be modelled as a
relaxation term in the optical energy density equation. Hence the transfer
of heat to the package is mostly governed by acoustic phonons, with high
group velocity. In general, their scattering mechanisms can be distinguished
into Normal and Resistive processes (which do not conserve momentum).
Resistive processes are the combination of defect scattering, boundary scattering, and Umklapp processes. In silicon, at room temperature and above,
Resistive processes are expected to be dominant. Due to the already mentioned difficulties, we shall approximate again this scattering with a relaxation. Regarding to the acoustic phonon relaxation time ac , some analytical
formula have been published, but we prefer to use an experimental value
ac = 50 80 ps, obtained for silicon films at room temperature.
3. Moment equations
Starting from the transport equations (2),(3) one can obtain balance
equations for macroscopic quantities associated to the flow. By multiplying

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(2) by a weight function A (k) and (3) by B (q), and integrating over R3 ,
one finds :
Z
Z
f
e i
f
MA
i
+ 3 A (k)v (k) i dk E
A (k) i dk
(14)
3
t
x
~
k
R
R
Z
X
=
A (k)Qep
g [f, Ng ]dk
3
R
g
(15)
Z
Z


MB
Ng
i
pp
+ 3 B (q)ug (q) i dq =
B (q) Qpe
g [f, Ng ] + Qg [Ng ] dq
3
t
x
R
R
where
(16)

MA =

R3

A (k)f dk

MB =

R3

B (q)Ng dq

are the moments relative to the weight functions A (k) and B (q). Since
Z
Z
Z
(k)
f
i
A (k) i dk =
A (k)f n d
f
dk
k
ki
D
D
D
with ni the outward unit normal field on the boundary D of the domain
D and d as the surface element of D, supposing that f tends to zero
sufficiently fast as k , the integral over D vanishes and eq.(3) becomes
Z
Z
MA

e i
A (k)
i
(17)
+ i
A (k)v (k)f dk + E
f
dk
3
3
t
x R
~
ki
R
=

XZ
g

A (k)Qep
g [f, Ng ]dk .

If we choose 8-moments model with

A = (1, ~k, , v)
one obtains from eq.(18) the following balance equations
(18)
(19)
(20)
(21)

n (nV i )
+
=0
t
xi
(nP i ) (nU ij )
+
+ neE i = nCPi
t
xj
(nW ) (nS i )
+
+ neVi E i = nCW
t
xi
(nS i ) (nF ij )
i
+
+ neEj Gij = nCW
t
xj

115

V. Di Stefano

where n is the electron density, V i the electron velocity, W the electron

energy, S i the electron energy flux, P i the electron crystal momentum, U ij
the flux of crystal momentum, F ij the flux of electron energy flux, CPi the
production of electron crystal momentum, CW the production of electron
i the production of electron energy flux.
energy, CW
To describe the phonon transport we have chosen a 4-moments model with
B = (~g , ~g ug ) ,
which in our case writes
B = (~vs |q|, ~vs2 q i , ~op ) .

(22)

Then equations (15) yield:

Wac
Qi
+
=C
t
xi
Qi Mij
+
= Ci
t
xj
Wop
= Cop
t

(23)
(24)
(25)

where Wac is the acoustic phonon energy density, Qi the acoustic phonon
heat flux, Mij the acoustic phonon flux of heat flux, C the production
of acoustic phonon energy density, C i the production of acoustic phonon
heat flux, Wop the optical phonon energy density and Cop the production of
optical phonon energy density.
4. Maximum Entropy Principle and closure relations.
The moment equations (18)-(21),(23)-(25) are not closed. If we assume
as fundamental variables n, V i , W , S i , Wac , Qi , Wop , which have a direct
physical interpretation, the closure problem consists in expressing the highorder fluxes U ij , Gij , F ij , Mij and the moments of the collisional terms
i , C, C i , C
CPi , CW , CW
op as function of the fundamental variables. A good,
physically motivated way to obtain constitutive equations is by means of
the Maximum Entropy Principle (MEP) [5,10]. It gives a form of the distribution function that makes the best use of the knowledge of a finite number
of moments. By using this ansatz, the closure equations for the fluxes of
the electron transport write [11]
(26)

2
U ij = W ij
3

m F ij =

10 2
W ij
9

5
m Gij = W ij
3

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and those for the acoustic phonons [12]

(27)
(28)

1
1
M = vs2 Wac ij + vs2 Wac (3 1)
3
2
s

2
3
5 4
Q
1
=
,
3 3
4 vs Wac
ij

Qi Qj
1
ij
2
Q
3
Q=

Qi Qi .

Moreover, following a very crude approximation used in most hydrodynamic models [3,13], we shall assume the energy production terms to be of
relaxation type. Since the electrons lose their energy to optical phonons, we
shall assume
(29)

nCW = H = n

W Wop
W

Wop
= ~op
2

is the optical phonon energy (59.7 meV), and

where Wop
W the electron
energy relaxation time. Then, as said, optical phonons decay into acoustic
phonons, consequently the production term C is given by

C=

(30)

Wop Wac
op

and, since the energy of any system can only change because of the
interactions with some external agent, i.e. the total energy production
(Rc = nCW + C + Cop ) must be zero, we obtain
(31)

Cop = n

W Wop
Wop Wac

W
op

where op is the optical phonon relaxation time. The remaining production

terms are modeled as
nCPi = m

nV i
P

i
nCW
=

nS i
S

C i = m vs2

nV i
Qi

P
ac

The relaxation times for the energy and momentum are those obtained
in [14], i.e.
(32)

P = m

0 TL
e Te

W =

m 0 TL 3 0 kB Te TL
+
2 e Te
2 evs2 Te + TL

where Te is the electron temperature which is related to the electron energy

by
3
1
W = kB Te + m V 2 ,
2
2

117

V. Di Stefano

TL is the lattice temperature and 0 (TL , ND ) is the Caughey-Thomas electron mobility. In order to have an estimate of the relaxation time for the
energy flux S , we have introduced the ratio r=S /P . MC simulations have
been performed in intrinsic (bulk) silicon [15], showing a weak dependence
on the lattice temperature. In the sequel we shall take r= 0.8.
5. The Extended Hydrodynamic model
By using the results of the previous sections, substituting eq.(19) with
a linear combination of equations (19) and (21), we have the following
Extended Hydrodynamic Model (hereafter EHM):
(33)

(34)

n (nV i )
+
=0
t
xi

(nm V i )

+ j n(U ij 2m F ij ) + neEj (1 2m Gij )
t
x
=

nS i
nP i
+ 2m
P
S

(35)

W Wop
(nW ) (nS i )
i
+
+
neV
E
=
n
i
t
xi
W

(36)

(nS i ) (nF ij )
nS i
ij
+
+
neE
G
=

j
t
xj
S

(37)

Wac
Qi
Wop Wac
+
=
i
t
x
op

(38)

i
Qi
Qi Mij
2 nP
+
=
v

s
t
xj
P
ac

(39)

W Wop
Wop
Wop Wac
=n

t
W
op

together with the closure relations for the fluxes (26), (27), (28).
The mathematical properties of the above system have been studied in [16],
showing that the system is of hyperbolic type.

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Moreover, from eq.(35), it is possible to observe that the right-hand-side

represents the heat generation rate

W Wop
H = n
W

(40)

which is different from the heat generation rate given in (1).

In the one-dimensional and stationary case the model writes as follows:
(41)
(42)
(43)
(44)
(45)
(46)
(47)

d(nV )
=0
dx
2 d(nW )
d
nm V
ne
=
3 dx
dx
P

W Wop
d(nS)
d
neV
= n
dx
dx
W
d
nm S
10 d(nW 2 ) 5
neW
=
9
dx
3
dx
S
dQ
Wop Wac
=
dx
op
dM
nm V
Q
= vs2

dx
P
ac

W Wop
Wop Wac
n

=0 .
W
op

From eq. (47) we obtain

Wop = Wac + n

op

(W Wop
)
W

and the system, in the unknowns (n, V, W, S, Wac , Q, ), yields

(48)

fn =

d(nV )
=0
dx

(49)

fV =

2 d(nW )
d nm V
ne
+
=0
3 dx
dx
P

(50)

fW =

W Wop
d(nS)
d
neV
+n
=0
dx
dx
W

(51)

fS =

10 d(nW 2 ) 5
d nm S
neW
+
=0
9
dx
3
dx
S

119

V. Di Stefano

(52)

fWac =

(53)

fQ =

(54)

f =

W Wop
dQ
n
=0
dx
W

dM
nm V
Q
vs2
+
=0
dx
P
ac
d2
+ e(ND n) = 0
dx2

together with the closure relations (27),(28). The acoustic phonon energy
density can be related to the acoustic phonon temperature, via the specific
heat at constant volume cV [17], i.e.
(55)

dWac = cV (Tac )dTac

and in a neighborhood of the room temperature T0 we have

Tac = T0 +

1
0
(Wac Wac
)
cV (T0 )

0 is the acoustic phonon energy density at equilibrium.

where Wac
For boundary conditions we take charge neutral contacts in thermal equilibrium with the ambient temperature, i.e.

n(0) = n(L) = ND

Tac (0) = T0 = 300

3
0
kB T0 , S(0) = S(L) = 0 , Wac (0) = Wac
2
kB T0
n
kB T0
n
(0) =
log
, (L) =
log
+ eVb
e
ni
e
ni

W (0) = W (L) =

where L is the device length, ni is the intrinsic carrier concentration in

silicon (1.45 1010 cm3 ), and Vb is the bias potential.
The main problem is how to fix the phonon heat flux boundary condition,
because in the Extended Hydrodynamic Model (EHM) this quantity represents an independent variable.
Physically, one expects some heat flow at the boundaries, which in principle
is not known. If the following Dirichlet boundary conditions are fixed
Q(0) = Q(L) = 0

0
Wac

Wac (L) =

then, the results obtained with the EHM model show oscillations, which
are likely due to insufficient modeling of the boundary.

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One possibility is to fix Robin boundary conditions, which interpolate between Dirichlet and Neumann boundary conditions. These conditions are:
dWac
0
+ 1 (Wac Wac
) = 0 at
dx
dQ
+ 2 Q = 0 at
dx
dTac
+ 3 (Tac T0 ) = 0 at
dx

x=L
x = 0, L
x=L

where 1 , 2 , 3 are suitable parameters.

By using this ansatz, the oscillations in the EHM model disappear.
In order to find a numerical solution, this system has been discretized by
using central differences and the box integration method, following the numerical scheme used in [18,19]. The variables n, , W , S, Tac are defined at
the grid points i = 0, 1, ..., N 1, N . The boundary conditions specify these
variables at i = 0 and i = N . The velocity V is defined at the midpoints
of the elements li (i = 1, ..., N ) connecting the grid points i 1, i. Then all
equations are enforced at the interior grid points i = 1, 2, ....N 1, while
eq.(49) is enforced at the midpoints of the elements li , i = 1, ..., N .
The linearization of the system is done via Newtons method
J~x = f~
where J is the Jacobian , ~x is the correction vector, and f~ is the residual
vector
~x = (n, V, W, S, , Tac )T

f~ = (fn , fV , fW , fS , f , fTac )T .

In the Jacobian, after discretization, each block is diagonal, bi-diagonal or

tri-diagonal. As an initial guess for the solution we have taken
n = ND

V =0

3
W = kB T0
2

S=0 ,

kB T0
n
log
, Tac = T0 = 300K .
e
ni
Starting from this initial guess, the new solution is given by
=

~xnew = ~xold + t~x

where t (0,1) is a damping factor, chosen to ensure that the norm of
the residual vector f~ decreases monotonically. However, because the initial
guess is very far from the real solution, we have used the continuation
method: at the beginning the applied external potential is set to a low value,
then it is increased, step by step, to reach the given potential difference.

121

V. Di Stefano

6. Simulations and results

The simplest benchmark used in the literature is given by the onedimensional n+ n n+ silicon diode. This unipolar device consists of
two highly doped regions n+ , called cathode and anode, connected by a
less doped region n, called channel. In our simulations, the n+ regions are
100 nm-long doped to a density ND = 1019 cm3 , while the channel is 100
nm-long doped to a density ND = 1016 cm3 , and the applied bias Vb = 1.2
V.
Such device has been simulated with EHM model. Moreover, in the same
graphics there are the data obtained by using an isothermal Monte Carlo
simulator [20], just to have a more physical comparison.
In the figure 1 we plot the electron velocity along the device. It is evident
that the behaviour of the EHM is similar to the behaviour of the Monte
Carlo simulation, with a difference in correspondence of the second junction, in which EHM produces a little spike.
The figure 2 shows that the electron temperature for EHM is below the
isothermal MC data, for which the maximum is about 0.33 eV. This is due
to the fact that, since the lattice is heated up, the atoms oscillate more frequently from their equilibrium position: consequently there are more scatterings with the electrons and more energy dissipation.
In figure 3 we plot the potential. It is evident that there are not relevant
differences between the EHM model and the Monte Carlo simulator.
The figure 4 shows the heat generation rate H produced in the device,
2.5
EHM
MC isoth.

velocity (107 cm/sec)

1.5

0.5

50

100

150
x (nm)

200

250

300

Fig. 1. The mean electron velocity versus the position, evaluated with EHM and an
isothermal MC simulator.

given by eq. 40 and eq.(1) (with R = G = 0). This figure reveals a small
negative heat generation at the beginning of the channel, with a minimum

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0.35
EHM
MC isoth.
0.3

electron temp (eV)

0.25

0.2

0.15

0.1

0.05

50

100

150
x (nm)

200

250

300

Fig. 2. The electron temperature versus the position, evaluated with EHM and an
isothermal MC simulator.
0.2
EHM
MC isoth.
0

potential (eV)

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.2

50

100

150
x (nm)

200

250

300

Fig. 3. The electric potential versus the position, evaluated with EHM and an isothermal
MC simulator.

of -0.5 1011 W/cm3 for the formula given in eq.(1) and about -0.3 1011
W/cm3 for the EHM model. This is a thermoelectric (Peltier) effect due
to electron injection across the potential barrier from the cathode to the
channel. This is the so called built-in potential, shown in figure 3 at x =
100 nm. Electrons diffusing against the energy barrier extract the energy
required to move up the conduction band slope from the lattice, through
net phonon absorption. Moreover, the EHM model predicts that most of
the Joule heat is dissipated into the anode region, and not in the channel,
as shown by the eq.(1) and confirmed by MC studies [21].
The Fig. 5 shows the acoustic phonon temperature.
In figure 6 we plot the heat flux produced in the device by using the EHM

123

V. Di Stefano

4
EHM
JxE
3.5

Heat Generation rate (10

11

W/cm )

2.5

1.5

0.5

0.5

50

100

150
x (nm)

200

250

300

Fig. 4. The heat generation rate H versus the position, evaluated with EHM by using
eq. 40 and an isothermal MC simulator.
301.8
EHM
301.6

301.4

Acoustic phonon temp (K)

301.2

301

300.8

300.6

300.4

300.2

300

299.8

50

100

150
x (nm)

200

250

300

Fig. 5. The acoustic phonon temperature Tac versus the position obtained by using the
EHM model.

model: in this case the heat flux is an independent variable of the model.
The sign of the heat flux is consistent with the corresponding acoustic
phonon temperature, as in Fig. 5.

7. Conclusions
We have introduced an Extended Hydrodynamic model to study the
heat conduction in thin silicon semiconductor devices.
In this model the closure of the high-order moments has been achieved with
the Maximum Entropy Principle, whereas the closure of the production
terms with relaxation terms, consistently to the first principle of Thermo-

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0.84
EHM

Acoustic heat flux (10 W/cm )

0.85

0.86

0.87

0.88

0.89

Fig. 6.

50

100

150
x (nm)

200

250

300

The acoustic heat flux density versus the position evaluated with EHM.

dynamics.
The most important differences between the EHM model and the isothermal
MC simulator are in the electron velocity and in the electron temperature.
In fact, in the first case, as seen, EHM produces a bigger spike with respect
to MC, near the second junction, while the electron temperature is smaller.
Moreover, the EHM model predicts that most of the Joule heat is dissipated
into the anode region and not in the channel.
These behaviours should be studied also in the 2D case for more realistic
devices. Work along this line is in progress and will be presented in the next
future.
Acknowledgements.
This work has been supported by Progetti di ricerca di Ateneo Universit`a degli Studi di Catania, and Progetto Giovani Ricercatori GNFM
2009.
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