"Linear kink effect" induced by electron valence band tunneling in ultrathin gate oxide bulk and SOI MOSFETs

In this paper, evidence will be provided for the existence of a new class of floating body effects, occurring in SOI and bulk MOSFETs in the linear operation regime and called here the linear kink effects (LKEs). It will be shown that for a sufficiently large front-gate voltage V/sub G/, the transconductance g/sub m/ exhibits a second peak, both for n- and p-channel devices. The effect is most pronounced for partially depleted (PD) n-MOSFETs or bulk MOSFETs at cryogenic temperatures. It occurs as well in fully depleted (FD) transistors, with the back-gate preferably biased into accumulation. Associated with the LKE in the drain current, there is a strong increase of the low-frequency noise spectral density S/sub I/. Similar as for the impact-ionization related noise overshoot, it is observed that the nature of the spectrum changes from 1/f-like to Lorentzian in the LKE region. It is finally shown that the switching off transients change their sign from negative to positive for V/sub G on/ above the LKE threshold, giving evidence for the presence of majority carriers in the film during the ON phase.