Author Archives: Juan

TCAD app free

The TCAD App is now free!

The TCAD App version 2.0 has some exciting updates.

  • App is renamed to “TCAD app”
  • Impact ionization model added
  • Menus updated
  • Easier plot navigation
  • Series resistance available to aid in impact ionization model results
  • Stop simulation and keep partial results to stop long running simulation early

Get it on Google Play
Download on the App Store

TCAD app free through January 18

Now (January 11, 2024) through January 18, 2024, the TCAD app is free for download. After this, you will be entitled to any free future updates.

The TCAD App version 2.0 has some exciting updates.

  • App is renamed to “TCAD app”
  • Impact ionization model added
  • Menus updated
  • Easier plot navigation
  • Series resistance available to aid in impact ionization model results
  • Stop simulation and keep partial results to stop long running simulation early

Get it on Google Play
Download on the App Store

Cloud Computing with DEVSIM Version 2.7.1

With DEVSIM 2.7.1, we now add ARM 64 bit Linux to our supported platforms.

  • Linux x86_64 and aarch64
  • macOS x86_64 and arm64
  • Microsoft Windows x64

This new support enables the use of DEVSIM on ARM based hardware running on Amazon AWS EC2 and Google Cloud Compute Engine instances. This enable users to balance performance and price when running this application on the cloud.

All of our ARM 64 bit builds default to the use of UMFPACK 5.1 for the direct solver. The x86_64 bit builds may also use the Intel MKL Pardiso direct solver.

As always, our software is available to download using the Python package manager from PyPi – The Python Package Index.

Avalanche Modeling

In the latest version of the TCAD app, the Avalanche model is implemented using this code to create the Okuto Crowell model and its derivatives:

ii_models = (
('Fava_n', 'abs(dEFn)',),
('Fava_p', 'abs(dEFp)',),
('Ion_coeff_n', 'a_n*Fava_n*exp(-((b_n/(Fava_n+1e-30))^2))',),
('Ion_coeff_p', 'a_p*Fava_p*exp(-((b_p/(Fava_p+1e-30))^2))',),
('Imp_rate', '(Ion_coeff_n*(abs(ElectronCurrent))+Ion_coeff_p*(abs(HoleCurrent)))/ElectronCharge',),
('qGn_imp', 'ElectronCharge * Imp_rate',),
('qGp_imp', '-ElectronCharge * Imp_rate',),
)
for n, e in ii_models:
CreateEdgeModel(device, region, n, e)
for v in ('Potential', 'Electrons', 'Holes'):
CreateEdgeModelDerivatives(device, region, n, e, v)

Note that this is the actual Python code, and DEVSIM parses the model equations and creates the symbolic derivatives. The resulting models are then integrated along each edge in the device region by specifying them as edge_average models on the electron and hole continuity equations.

Special thanks to user @akirt

TCAD app updates

The TCAD App version 2.0 has some exciting updates.

  • App is renamed to “TCAD app”
  • Impact ionization model added
  • Menus updated
  • Easier plot navigation
  • Series resistance available to aid in impact ionization model results
  • Stop simulation and keep partial results to stop long running simulation early

App links are located at https://tcad.app

New Mobile App

DEVSIM LLC is pleased to announce the DEVSIM mobile app. The first of its kind, it is a TCAD semiconductor device simulator available for both Android and Apple devices. Its simulation engine is the DEVSIM open source TCAD simulator.

This release provides a 1 dimensional diode example, where you can experiment with different device parameters and visualize the results. Future versions will expand to include other textbook examples.

Quasi Fermi levels of 1D diode.

Get it on Google Play
Download on the App Store

Charon TCAD software open source release

The Charon simulator is now available under an open source software license:
https://charon.sandia.gov

This is an exciting development in the world of TCAD simulation, to have an open source TCAD simulator targeted toward large simulation problems.

From their website:

Charon is an open-source semiconductor device modeling code, widely referred to as a TCAD (technology computer-aided design) code, developed at Sandia National Laboratories. It is written in C++ and relies on another Sandia open-source project, Trilinos, for supporting code, such as nonlinear and linear solvers, finite-element and finite-volume libraries, I/O, etc. In addition to running on most Linux-based computers Charon also supports simulation of extremely large problems on massively parallel computing systems that support the MPI standard.

DEVSIM 1.4.0 Release

Introduction

DEVSIM 1.4.0 is now available for download.  Please visit https://devsim.org for more information about the software.  Documentation is available from https://devsim.net.  Binary releases are available from:

https://github.com/devsim/devsim/releases

The devsim.custom_equation() and devsim.register_function() commands take Python functions, instead of the a string with the function name.

The following commands are available to store data on edges and element edges:

  • edge_solution()
  • set_edge_values()
  • element_solution()
  • set_element_values()

DEVSIM 1.3.0 Release

Introduction

DEVSIM 1.3.0 is now available for download.  Please visit https://devsim.org for more information about the software.  Documentation is availabe from https://devsim.net.  Binary releases are available from:

https://github.com/devsim/devsim/releases

Python 3 Examples

All of the Tcl regression tests in the testing directory have been converted to Python 3. These tests serve as examples for features that were previously only tested using Tcl scripting.

Tcl Support Deprecated

Tcl support is deprecated and will be removed in a future release of the software.

Binary Releases

Scripting Languages

Python 3 is now the only scripting language in the releases available from:

https://github.com/devsim/devsim/releases

Math Library

The Microsoft Windows version now uses Intel MKL Pardiso for direct matrix factorization. Both Linux and Apple macOS have been using Intel MKL Pardiso since November 1, 2015. Binary releases for all operating systems use BLAS/LAPACK routines from Intel Math Kernel Library.

DEVSIM 1.2.0 Release

DEVSIM releases now have better support for Python 3. Using the stable ABI, the software is able to run with newer Python 3 releases, without rebuilding the software.

Support for Python 2.7 has been removed.

The banner has been removed when the DEVSIM module is imported.

The symdiff python module is now part of the DEVSIM release. This module has additional features not available using the devsim.symdiff command from DEVSIM.

Please visit https://devsim.org for information about downloading this software and its documentation. SYMDIFF is available from https://symdiff.org.