Self-healing electrostatic discharge power clamp

摘要

Circuits and methods of fabricating circuits that provide electrostatic discharge protection, as well as methods of protecting an integrated circuit from electrostatic discharge. The protection circuit may include a power clamp device, a timing circuit including a resistor and a capacitor that is coupled with the resistor at a node, and a power clamp device coupled with the timing circuit at the node. The capacitor includes a plurality of capacitor elements. The protection circuit further includes a plurality of electronic fuses. Each electronic fuse is coupled with a respective one of the capacitor elements. A field effect transistor may be coupled in parallel with the resistor of the timing circuit, and may be used to bypass the resistor to provide a programming current to any electronic fuse coupled with a capacitor element of abnormally low impedance.

主权项

1. A method of fabricating a timing circuit for an electrostatic protection circuit, the method comprising:
forming, using a substrate, a first capacitor element and a second capacitor element of a capacitor of the timing circuit; forming a first electronic fuse coupled with the first capacitor element; forming a second electronic fuse coupled with the second capacitor element; forming a resistor coupled in series with the first capacitor element and coupled in series with the second capacitor element; and forming, using the substrate, a field effect transistor that is directly coupled in parallel with the resistor.