Spatial Domain Decomposition in Silicon Devices and Its Application To Transient Device Analysis

The transient simulation of multiple semiconductor devices is critical in the analysis of dynamic effects such as latch-up. During transient simulation, a large system of coupled nonlinear partial differential equations (PDE) must be solved with considerable effort. In this paper, we present a method of decomposing the spatial domain of silicon (containing one or more devices) into smaller subdomains. A transient simulation algorithm can then use different time-steps within each subdomain and avoid a full solution of the nonlinear PDE's in areas where the solution does not change rapidly.