Analytical modeling of nonideal Schottky diode with series and shunt resistance and application in hydrogen gas sensors

Abstract

This work proposes a method for extracting the barrier height, ideality factor, series, and shunt resistances of Schottky diodes with high accuracy and consistency. By defining the voltage boundaries for the three regions of the current–voltage curve that are controlled by shunt resistance, thermal emission, and series resistance, respectively, the method can avoid the problems of traditional methods through nonlinear fitting and iterations. The application on Schottky-diode-type hydrogen sensor with a structure of Pd/WO3/SiC reveals excellent agreement between the extracted voltage boundaries and the turning points on the current–voltage curve under different temperatures and hydrogen concentrations. The average mean-squared error of the model current–voltage data vs. experimental data is 0.371, more than five times smaller than that of traditional methods based on least-squares linear regression.