The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Apr. 18, 2006
Filed:
Oct. 01, 2002
Andrew Horch, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Scott Robins, San Jose, CA (US);
Andrew Horch, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Scott Robins, San Jose, CA (US);
TRAM, Inc., Milpitas, CA (US);
Abstract
A semiconductor device includes a thyristor having at least one body region thereof disposed in a substrate, and a filled trench having a conductive material. According to an example embodiment of the present invention, a conductive material having a narrow upper portion over a relatively wide lower portion is in a filled trench adjacent to at least one thyristor body region in a substrate. In one implementation, a thyristor control port is located over the wide lower portion and adjacent to the narrow upper portion of the conductive shunt and is adapted for capacitively coupling to the thyristor body region in the substrate for controlling current in the thyristor. In another implementation, the conductive material is electrically coupled to a buried emitter region of the thyristor and arranged for shunting current between the buried emitter region and a circuit node near an upper portion of the conductive material. With these approaches, conductive material can be used to fill a portion of the trench that electrically isolates a portion of a thyristor body in a substrate and/or to shunt current between a circuit node in the substrate, such as a buried emitter region, and an upper circuit node.