Loveless Amanda M, Meng Guodong, Ying Qi, Wu Feihong, Wang Kejing, Cheng Yonghong, Garner Allen L
School of Nuclear Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, 47907, USA.
State Key Laboratory of Electrical Insulation and Power Equipment, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an, 710049, China.
Sci Rep. 2019 Apr 5;9(1):5669. doi: 10.1038/s41598-019-42111-2.
The decrease in electronic device size necessitates greater understanding of gas breakdown and electron emission at microscale to optimize performance. While traditional breakdown theory using Paschen's law (PL), driven by Townsend avalanche, fails for gap distance d [Formula: see text] 15 μm, recent studies have derived analytic equations for breakdown voltage when field emission and Townsend avalanche drive breakdown. This study derives a new analytic equation that predicts breakdown voltage V within 4% of the exact numerical results of a previously derived theory and new experimental results at subatmospheric pressure for gap distances from 1-25 μm. At atmospheric pressure, V transitions to PL near the product of pressure and gap distance, pd, corresponding to the Paschen minimum; at lower pressures, the transition to PL occurs to the left of the minimum. We further show that the work function plays a major role in determining which side of the Paschen minimum V transitions to PL as pressure approaches atmospheric pressure while field enhancement and the secondary emission coefficient play smaller roles. These results indicate that appropriate combinations of these parameters cause V to transition to PL to the left of the Paschen minimum, which would yield an extended plateau similar to some microscale gas breakdown experimental observations.
电子设备尺寸的减小使得有必要更深入地了解微尺度下的气体击穿和电子发射，以优化性能。虽然由汤森德雪崩驱动的、使用帕邢定律（PL）的传统击穿理论在间隙距离d ＜ 15 μm时失效，但最近的研究已经推导出了在场发射和汤森德雪崩驱动击穿时的击穿电压解析方程。本研究推导出了一个新的解析方程，该方程预测的击穿电压V与先前推导理论的精确数值结果以及亚大气压下1 - 25 μm间隙距离的新实验结果相差在4%以内。在大气压下，V在压力与间隙距离的乘积pd（对应于帕邢最小值）附近转变为PL；在较低压力下，向PL的转变发生在最小值左侧。我们进一步表明，当压力接近大气压时，功函数在决定V向PL转变到帕邢最小值的哪一侧起主要作用，而场增强和二次发射系数起的作用较小。这些结果表明，这些参数的适当组合会使V在帕邢最小值左侧转变为PL，这将产生类似于一些微尺度气体击穿实验观测结果的扩展平台。
