A Computational Approach for Simulating p-Type Silicon Piezoresistor Using Four Point Bending Setup

T.H. Tan[1], S.J.N. Mitchell[1], D.W. McNeill[1], H. Wadsworth[2], S. Strahan[2]
[1]Queen's University Belfast, Belfast, United Kingdom
[2]Schrader Electronics Ltd, Antrim, United Kingdom
Published in 2013

The piezoresistance effect is defined as change in resistance due to applied stress. Silicon has a relatively large piezoresistance effect which has been known since 1954. A four point bending setup is proposed and designed to analyze the piezoresistance effect in p-type silicon. This setup is used to apply uniform and uniaxial stress along the crystal direction. The main aim of this work is to investigate the piezoresistive characteristic of p-type resistors as a function of doping concentrations using COMSOL Multiphysics®. Simulation results are compared with experimental data.