Ansys Charge Plus in Semiconductor Manufacturing
Plasma processing is difficult to simulate because it involves fast-moving charged particles, complex chemistry, and tiny boundary effects all happening at once. To get accurate results, simulation tools must go beyond simple fluid models and capture the real particle physics driving the process.
Ansys Charge Plus addresses multi-scale physics by hybridizing kinetic, electromagnetic (EM), and fluid models; enabling capture of both fine-scale particle behavior and full reactor-scale plasma dynamics in a single simulation.
Key takeaways:
- Hybrid multi-scale plasma simulation
- Accurate wafer-level process modeling
- Physics-based accuracy
- Fast, scalable performance
About Ansys Charge Plus
What is Ansys Charge Plus?
Ansys Charge Plus is a multiphysics simulation software used to model electrical charging, discharging, electrostatic discharge (ESD), and plasma-interactions in electronic systems.
It enables engineers to predict charge-related failures early in the design process, reducing risk, testing costs, and certification delays.
Why use Ansys Charge Plus?
Use Ansys Charge Plus to simulate complex charging and plasma effects that are difficult or impossible to test physically. It helps reduce design risk, eliminate costly rework, and accelerate certification by identifying issues early.
What does Ansys Charge Plus simulate?
Ansys Charge Plus simulates a wide range of charging and discharge-related phenomena, including:
- ESD and fast transient events
- Surface and internal charging in materials and components
- Charged particle transport and plasma interactions
- Electrical arcing and dielectric or air breakdown
- Radiation-induced charging effects
These capabilities help engineers identify failure mechanisms, prevent material degradation, and improve system reliability before building physical prototypes.
Where is Ansys Charge Plus Used
What industries use Ansys Charge Plus?
Ansys Charge Plus is used across industries where charge buildup, plasma effects, and high-voltage risks impact performance and safety:
- Semiconductor: Plasma processing, etching, depositions, and ESD protection
- Aerospace and defense: Spacecraft charging, radiation effects, and high-altitude electrical phenomena
- Automotive and electrical vehicles: High-voltage systems, wiring, and ESD risk mitigation
- Consumer electronics: ESD compliance and device reliability
- Industrial and power systems: High-voltage equipment, arcing, and electrical safety
Core Capabilities and Simulation Features
How does Ansys Charge Plus integrate with other tools?
Ansys Charge plus integrates with the Ansys multiphysics ecosystem, including tools for electromagnetics, fluids, and system-level simulation, enabling coupled analysis of electrical, plasma, and environmental effects in a single workflow.
What solvers make up Ansys Charge Plus?
Ansys Charge Plus addresses multi-scale kinetic effects by combining multiple solver types in a single, coupled simulation environment. Specifically:
- Particle-in-Cell (PIC) captures fast, small-scale kinetic effects like electron motion and non-equilibrium behavior
- Finite Element electromagnetic solvers handle radio frequency (RF) fields and wave-plasma interactions
- Fluid/CFD models represent bulk gas flow and larger-scale plasma behavior
- Chemistry and reaction models account for longer-timescale plasma processes and material interactions
Ansys Charge Plus for Semiconductor Manufacturing
Why use simulation in semiconductor manufacturing?
Manufacturers want to simulate plasma processes in semiconductor manufacturing to predict and optimize how plasma interacts with materials, improving etching, deposition, and overall chip performance without relying on costly trial-and-error experiments.
It also provides visibility into complex physics inside the chamber that cannot be directly measured, helping engineers refine processes faster and produce higher-quality, more reliable chips.
What semiconductor processes can Ansys Charge Plus model?
Ansys Charge Plus models a wide range of plasma-based semiconductor manufacturing processes, with a focus on understanding plasma behavior, surface interactions, and charge effects at the wafer level.
Key processes include:
- Plasma-Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition (PECVD): Simulate thin-film deposition processes, including film growth, plasma chemistry, and surface reactions on wafers
- Plasma etching: Models how ions and reactive species interact with the wafer surface to remove material and define device structures
- Sputtering and plasma-based coating processes: Simulates plasma generation and material transport for thin-film deposition and coating applications
- RF plasma processes: Captures how radio-frequency fields drive plasma formation and influence ion energy and distribution at the wafer
- Plasma sheath and wafer-surface interactions: Models the plasma sheath region near the wafer, which governs ion energy, angular distribution, and surface reactions critical to process outcomes
- Gas-phase plasma chemistry and transport: Simulates how charged species, neutrals, and reactions evolve within the plasma reactor, including multi-species and multi-reaction environments
- ESD and charging effects in semiconductor equipment: Helps predict charge buildup and discharge risks that can damage wafers and fabrication hardware
Plasma Simulation Approach
How is Ansys Charge Plus used in plasma processes simulation?
Plasma processes span extremely different scales from nanoseconds to seconds and microns to meters. Ansys Charge plus bridges these by:
- Using PIC for accuracy where physics demands it
- Using fluid models where efficiency is acceptable
- Coupling the two together so information flows across scales (particles ↔ fields ↔ chemistry)
How is Ansys Charge Plus different from traditional fluid plasma solvers?
Traditional plasma simulation tools use fluid models that approximate particle behavior and rely on assumptions like predefined electron energy distributions. Ansys Charge Plus uses a hybrid approach with PIC, EM, and fluid solvers to directly model plasma physics. This enables more accurate simulation of non-equilibrium plasmas, RF effects, and wafer-level interactions that fluid-only solvers cannot capture.
Why is PIC important for semiconductor plasma simulations?
PIC simulation is essential for modeling semiconductor plasma processes because it directly tracks electrons and ions instead of averaging their behavior. This provides accurate prediction of ion energy distribution, plasma sheath dynamics, and surface interactions, which are critical for optimizing etching, deposition, and process control in semiconductor manufacturing.
Performance, Speed, and Scalability
How does Ansys Charge Plus improve computational efficiency and scalability for plasma simulations?
Ansys Charge Plus is designed for high-performance plasma modeling with a patent pending semi-implicit time-stepping scheme, enabling fast simulation of complex RF plasmas. For example, 2D simulations of hundreds of RF cycles can be compounded in ~30 minutes, significantly reducing turnaround time.
In addition, Charge Plus supports GPU-accelerated 3D plasma simulations, allowing engineers to scale to large, multi-species plasma chambers with improved performance and throughput. As of 26R1, Charge Plus solves ICP problems on multi-GPU in 3D with 30 species and 100+ reactions. Faster solve times and GPU scaling enable parametric sweeps, design optimization, and larger, more realistic models without prohibitive compute costs.
Accuracy and Advanced Physics Modeling
How does Ansys Charge Plus eliminate EEDF approximation errors in plasma simulations?
Ansys Charge Plus uses a full PIC solver to directly calculate electron and ion behavior, eliminating the need for assumed electron energy distribution functions (EEDF). This approach produces realistic energy and angular distribution profiles at the wafer surface, accurately resolving sheath physics and improving prediction of plasma-surface interactions. More accurate EEDF modeling leads to better process control, improved yield, and reduced risk of simulation-driven design errors.
How does Ansys Charge Plus accurately capture nonlinear plasma behavior?
Ansys Charge Plus includes a PIC- Monte Carlo Collision (MCC) reaction solver that resolves detailed plasma chemistry and particle interactions. This allows the software to naturally capture nonlinear effects in plasma discharges, including coupling between fields, particles, and reactions. Accurately modeling nonlinear plasma dynamics is critical for predicting instabilities, processes variability, and chamber performance in real-world manufacturing environments.
How does Ansys Charge Plus model plasma sheaths in high-density simulations?
Ansys Charge Plus accurately models plasma sheaths in high-density conditions using validated analytical sheath models or a 1D PIC approach.
At high plasma densities, resolving the sheath with a fine mesh is computationally expensive and unnecessary. Instead, Charge Plus applies physics-based sheath models that:
- Maintain simulation accuracy without excessive meshing
- Enable efficient CCP and ICP plasma simulations
- Reflect industry-standard approaches used in plasma physics
Advanced Capabilities and Innovation
What is the multi-fidelity modeling approach in Ansys Charge Plus?
Ansys Charge Plus uses a multi-fidelity modeling approach by coupling with TCAD Sentaurus to capture both reactor-scale and feature-level plasma effects. This allows users to:
- Simulate the full 3D plasma chamber while resolving microscopic wafer features
- Accurately model how plasma interactions affect device structures
- Bridge large-scale plasma behavior with detailed semiconductor process physics
How does Ansys Charge Plus use AI in plasma simulations?
Ansys Charge Plus leverages AI and reduced-order modeling to accelerate complex plasma simulations without sacrificing accuracy. Through collaboration between EMA, Synopsys, and NVIDIA, users can:
- Develop AI-driven reduced-order models training on high-fidelity plasma simulations
- Significantly reduce simulation time for complex systems
- Apply these models to real-world plasma processes and custom applications
Organizations can also work with EMA experts to build tailored AI models for the specific plasma systems and workflows.
How comprehensive is the plasma chemistry database in Ansys Charge Plus?
The plasma chemistry database in Ansys Charge Plus is continuously expanding and designed to be flexible for advanced users. In addition to built-in reactions, users can:
- Define custom plasma chemistries and reaction sets
- Adapt simulations to specific materials, gases, or processes
- Extend the tool for specialized research or industrial applications
Validation and Proven History
Why is Ansys Charge Plus’s aerospace and defense heritage important for plasma and charging simulations?
Ansys Charge Plus benefits from a long history of validation in aerospace and defense applications, where accurate plasma and charging simulations are critical. Because spacecraft charging and plasma interactions share similar physics, this heritage provides:
- Proven validation against space environment data and literature
- Higher confidence in mission-critical simulations
- Continuous improvement through ongoing benchmarking and experimental validation
Why Charge Plus is Needed
What problems cannot be solved accurately without Ansys Charge Plus?
Traditional plasma simulation tools cannot reliably predict complex, multi-scale behaviors in semiconductor processes.
Ansys Charge Plus enables accurate modeling of:
- Ion energy and angular distributions at the wafer
- Plasma sheath behavior in RF and high-density plasmas
- Charging damage and ESD risks
- Nonlinear plasma dynamics and instabilities
- Coupled plasma chemistry and multi-species reactions
This level of fidelity is critical for improving yield, process uniformity, and device reliability.
Get Started
How can I get access to Ansys Charge Plus?
Ansys Charge Plus is available exclusively through Ansys, Part of Synopsys.
Does EMA offer consulting in addition to simulation software?
Yes. In addition to providing simulation software, EMA offers expert consulting to help organizations apply tools like Ansys Charge Plus to their specific engineering challenges. This includes guidance on plasma modeling, custom workflows, and advanced applications such as AI-driven modeling and specialized plasma systems.
Who should contact EMA?
EMA is a strong fit for:
- Semiconductor process engineers working on plasma etching, deposition, or wafer-level optimization
- Device and integration engineers evaluating plasma-material interactions and feature-level effects
- Equipment and tool designers developing plasma reactors, RF systems, or chamber hardware
- R&D teams modeling advanced plasma processes, new materials, or next-generation manufacturing techniques
How can I get started with EMA?
You can start by:
- Requesting a consultation
- Discussing your technical challenge
- Exploring simulation options
Contact EMA to speak with our team and get started.
