Electrostatic discharge protection device

摘要

An electrostatic discharge protection device and method decreases the latch-up susceptibility of an ESD structure by suppressing the injection of minority carriers that cause transistor action to occur. This is accomplished, for example, by using a metal contact to the n-substrate or n-well in place of or in parallel with the prior art p-diffusion. Using such metal contact forms a Schottky Barrier Diode (SBD) with the ESD structure. Since the SBD is a majority-carrier device, negligible minority carriers are injected when the SBD is in forward bias, thereby reducing the likelihood of latch-up.