MOSFET triggering silicon controlled rectifiers for electrostatic discharge protection circuits

In this paper we propose a new electrostatic discharge protection circuit called MOSFET-triggering silicon controlled rectifiers (MTSCR) for IC protection. The proposed new SCR circuit consists of a trigger controlling and a holding SCR circuit, and the trigger controlling circuit is made of a pMOSFET with its gate connected to the power supply line. The triggering current is due to the drain current passing through the MOSFET. The circuit can protect IC irrespective of the temporal voltage waveform of the overvoltage stress, and the static trigger voltage decreases with decreasing power supply voltage.