We present the experimental characterization of the optical emission from individual MOSFETs, due to hot-carriers. A complete understanding of the luminescence dependence on transistor parameters and processing is of crucial importance for assessing the role of hot-carriers in degrading the performances of modern CMOS technologies. Two different technological families, with channel lengths of transistors ranging from 0.2 /spl mu/m to 1.3 /spl mu/m, are compared in terms of luminescence emission. Two distinct behaviours in term of emission intensity have been found for short and long channel lengths. The experimental data of the emission intensity for different bias conditions was then used to develop a compact model to be use during SPICE-like simulations of ICs. Moreover the study and characterization of emission intensity is a valuable tool for investigating hot-carrier distributions and their impact on circuit reliability.
