Abstract
The problems of prematured snapback and false multiple breakdown are found in simulating semiconductor devices in the high temperature region. The only way to achieve accurate and efficient electrothermal simulation under these conditions is by adaptive regridding. An adaptive regridding algorithm that approaches the optimal efficiency by applying the equidistribution of local truncation error is developed. With this algorithm both problems are overcome. In addition, both simulation accuracy and efficiency are improved by at least a factor of two.