Non-linear thermal modeling of DMOS transistor and validation using electrical measurements and FEM simulations

The relevance of thermally non-linear silicon material models for transient thermal FEM simulations of smart power switches (SPS) is proved by a power silicon test device consisting of two power transistors and eleven integrated temperature sensors distributed over the silicon die. The test device is heated up by turning on an integrated power transistor in short-circuit for several milliseconds at two different initial temperatures. These thermal events correspond to a real situation that can occur in the application. The power dissipation in the power transistor is calculated from the measured source current and drain-source voltage, and subsequently used as an input to the FEM simulation. The temperature change on the test chip is measured by the integrated temperature sensors. An FEM model of the test chip encapsulated in a plastic package has been built in the FlexPDE simulator. The emphasis is put on the macroscopic modeling of the power transistor where an electro-thermal approach is reduced to a purely thermal one. Finally, the thermal events are simulated using FEM and compared to the temperature measurements. The results have shown that our modeling approach including non-linear properties of silicon can be used to investigate the thermal transients in SPS devices with high accuracy.