US Patent Issued to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing on Sept. 8 for "Electrostatic discharge protection" (Taiwanese Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., Sept. 8 -- United States Patent no. 12,731,986, issued on Sept. 8, was assigned to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd. (Hsinchu, Taiwan).

"Electrostatic discharge protection" was invented by Chia-Hui Chen (Hsinchu City, Taiwan) and Chia-Jung Chang (Hsinchu City, Taiwan).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A semiconductor device includes a conductive layer extending along a first lateral direction; a gate dielectric layer disposed over the conductive layer; a channel layer disposed over the gate dielectric layer and extending along a second lateral direction perpendicular to the first lateral direction; a first via-like structure, in direct contact with the channel layer, th...