Effect of oxide breakdown on RS latches

In this work, the influence of the oxide breakdown on RS latches performance has been analysed. The NAND and NOR RS latch topologies have been compared in terms of noise margin and switching times for different broken down transistors. Moreover, the influence of the additional current path due to BD and of the variation of the MOSFET parameters on the circuit functionality have been separately evaluated. The results show that RS latches do not lose functionality after BD. However, reductions on noise margin and variations on switching times are observed, which depend on the damaged transistor. The performance degradation of the circuit is mainly due to the additional post-BD gate current whereas the variation of the BD MOSFET parameters has only a small influence.