Hot-Spot Detection in Integrated Circuits by Substrate Heat-Flux Sensing

Author

Perpinà, X. ; Altet, J. ; Jordà, X. ; Vellvehi, M. ; Millán, J. ; Mestres, N.

Author_Institution

Inst. de Microelectron. de Barcelona IMB-CNM, Campus de la Univ. Autonoma de Barcelona, Barcelona

Volume

29

Issue

10

fYear

2008

Firstpage

1142

Lastpage

1144

Abstract

This letter presents a novel approach to detect hot spots (HSs) in active integrated circuits (ICs) and devices. It is based on sensing the HS heat flux within the chip substrate with a probe-laser beam. As the beam passes through the die, it experiences a deflection directly proportional to the heat flux found along its trajectory (internal infrared laser deflection technique). The proposed strategy allows inspecting the chip through its lateral sides (lateral access), avoiding the metal and passivation layers placed over the die. The obtained results demonstrate the suitability of this technique to locate and characterize devices behaving as hot spots in nowadays IC CMOS technologies.

Keywords

CMOS integrated circuits; integrated circuit testing; measurement by laser beam; thermal management (packaging); IC CMOS technologies; hot-spot detection; integrated circuits; internal infrared laser deflection technique; lateral access; probe-laser beam; substrate heat-flux sensing; Device thermal characterization; hot-spot (HS) detection; integrated circuit (IC) testing; substrate heat-flux sensing;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Electron Device Letters, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0741-3106

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/LED.2008.2002751

Filename

4623148