A Novel Seed Selection Algorithm for Test Time Reduction in BIST

The seed (initial state) of a pseudo-random pattern generator (PRPG) for built-in self-test (BIST), significantly influences the fault coverage and total test application time. This paper introduces a one-pass seed selection algorithm, for any known PRPG. Due to its single-pass nature, unlike the state-of-the-art exhaustive search methods, the proposed algorithm is more time and memory efficient. Experimental results on ISCAS´85 and ISCAS´89 benchmark circuits, and synthetic SoCs built out of the combinational benchmarks, show considerable reduction in test length within comparable fault efficiencies, almost 100%, with respect to the existing methods.