Dynamic fault dictionaries and two-stage fault isolation

This paper presents dynamic two stage fault isolation for sequential random logic VLSI circuits, and introduces limited and dynamic fault dictionaries. In the first stage of the dynamic process, a limited fault dictionary identifies candidate faults, which are further distinguished in the second stage by a dictionary generated dynamically for the candidate faults and a subset of the test vectors. This provides high resolution but avoids the costs of full static dictionaries. Two-stage fault isolation is evaluated for benchmark circuits and on defects in industrial circuits.