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:
Mar. 13, 2007
Filed:
Mar. 31, 2003
Muhammed Ayman Shibib, Wyomissing, PA (US);
Muhammed Ayman Shibib, Wyomissing, PA (US);
Agere Systems Inc., Allentown, PA (US);
Abstract
An electrostatic discharge (ESD) protection circuit for protecting a circuit from an ESD event, the ESD protection circuit comprises a metal-oxide semiconductor (MOS) device including a gate terminal, a first source/drain terminal, a second source/drain terminal and a bulk terminal, the bulk and first source/drain terminals being operatively coupled across the circuit to be protected, the gate and second source/drain terminals being coupled together; and a voltage generation circuit coupled between the bulk and gate terminals of the MOS device. The voltage generation circuit is configured to generate a voltage difference between the bulk and gate terminals of the MOS device during at least a portion of the ESD event. In this manner, a current handling capability of the MOS device is increased, thereby advantageously enabling a smaller sized device having a significantly smaller capacitance associated therewith to be employed in the ESD protection circuit.