Detection of intermittent resistive faults in electronic systems based on the mixed-signal boundary-scan standard

In avionics, like glide computers, the problem of No Faults Found (NFF) is a very serious and extremely costly affair. The rare occurrences and short bursts of these faults are the most difficult ones to detect and diagnose in the testing arena. Several techniques are now being developed in ICs by us to cope with one particular category of NFFs, being the intermittent resistive faults (IRF). The reuse of these (on-chip) embedded instruments for detection of these faults at the board-level has been investigated in conjunction with the possibilities of enhancing the (mixed-signal) boundary-scan standard IEEE 1149.4. This paper will explore how this can be accomplished.