Bilan SFS June 01

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Electromagnetic Robustness Issues for Deep
Submicron Technologies A. Boyer, S. Ben
Dhia INSA Toulouse Université de Toulouse /
LATTIS, France www.ic-emc.org
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• Outlines
• EMC / EMI issues
• Electromagnetic reliability issues
• Preliminary studies
• DSM IC Case Study
• EMR Characterization Methodology
• Experimental results
• Conclusion and prospective

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EMR team
Sonia Ben Dhia project leader Associate
Professor Sonia.bendhia_at_insa-toulouse.fr
Alexandre Boyer Assistant Professor Alexandre.boye
r_at_insa-toulouse.fr
Binhong Li PhD student Binhong.li_at_insa-toulouse.fr
Amadou Ndoye PhD student Amadou.ndoye_at_insa-toulou
se.fr
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EMC of ICs ?
Emission of EM waves
Susceptibility to EM waves
Carbon airplane
Radar
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EMC of ICs ?
EMC measurement
EMC design guidelines
EMC modeling
EMC model
Measurements
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Impact of technology scale down on EMC of ICs

• More EMC issues
• More reliability issues

R-S07MT-0004-062 Evaluation de la fiabilité
des composants submicroniques, December 2007

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Impact of technology scale down on EMC of ICs
New technology development
(DSM, higher integration, SiP, complex
architecture)
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Electromagnetic Robustness of ICs

• Electromagnetic Robustness is a new request
  from electronic equipment suppliers (for
  automotive, aerospace and consumer)
• Going further in electromagnetic behavior
  improvement and at the same time guarantee EMC
  over the component lifetime.

Reliability issues
EMC issues
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Electromagnetic Robustness of ICs

• This area is still under-explored and research
  communities on "IC reliability" and "IC
  electromagnetic compatibility" have often no
  overlap.
• Effects of IC ageing on the EMC levels evolution
  are still unknown.
• Could reliability issues of DSM technologies
  strongly affect EMC of ICs ?

Natural Aging
Fresh ICs
Aged ICs
Comparison of EMC levels
EMC characterization
EMC characterization
Statistical evaluation of EMC drifts
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Electromagnetic Robustness at system level

• Degradation of EMC mitigation techniques at
  system level
• Drift of IC emission/susceptibility levels

EMC risks increase !
Aging of power supply filter
Degradation of connection due to vibrations
IC
Aging of IC
PCB
Shielding joint corrosion
Shielding box
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Electromagnetic Robustness at system level

• Compatibility margin is required to ensure a
  sufficient level of system functional safety
• Component aging could affect the compatibility
  margin

Safety level is not ensure anymore !
Overdesign and unnecessary costs
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EMR Research topics

• Prove the aging effects on EMC
• Identify the links between IC degradations and
  EMC drifts
• Propose methodologies to characterize EMR
  adapted to industrial needs
• Develop EMR simulation methodologies
• Promote this thematic

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Preliminary studies Impact of aging on EMC of
ICs

• 3 case studies have been investigated to identify
  the effect and the links between aging on EMC.
• The following methodology have been employed

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Preliminary studies Impact of aging on EMC of
ICs

• Use of standard accelerated life tests to age the
  ICs. It consists in accelerating the damage
  accumulation rate for time dependent failure
  mechanisms.
• Different test conditions, like high temperature
  or high supply voltage, can be used to accelerate
  failure mechanisms.

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Case study n1 eXtrem Switch

• 0.25 µm BiCMOS Smart power component dedicated to
  automotive applications
• Investigations on effects of 4 different
  applicative and accelerated life tests on
  emission drift

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Case study n2 HCS12X

• 0.25 µm CMOS microcontroller, also dedicated to
  automotive market
• Investigations on effects of silicium accelerated
  aging tests (HTOL and LTOL) on IC susceptibility
• Study on correlations between susceptibility
  drift and other IC parameters (power supply
  impedance, I/O characteristics, power
  consumption, )

-1 dBm
-9 dBm
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Case study n3 ST I/O test chip C652V5

• CMOS Low Power 65 nm test chip from ST
  Microelectronics, containing several I/O
  structures
• Investigations on effects of silicium accelerated
  aging tests (HTOL and LTOL) on IC emission and
  susceptibility on a nanometric IC.

-10 dB !
Reduction of emission level
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Conclusion

• These preliminary studies have shown that
• Aging can have a significant effect on EMC and
  affect dramatically the system functional safety
• Silicium aging tests tend to decrease slightly
  the emission level
• Silicium aging tests can induce severe reduction
  of RF interference immunity, depending on the
  disturbed blocks
• No significant differences on EMC drift for DSM
  technologies compared to older technologies (to
  be confirmed on identical designs)
• But more dispersions between tested samples (to
  be confirmed on a commercial component)

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Prospectives

• Continue the investigation works proving links
  between aging and EMC
• Identify failure and degradation mechanisms which
  could have an impact on EMC ? development of a
  test chip with basic blocks
• Study the impact of aging on EMC protection
  structures (e.g on-chip decoupling capacitances)
• Degradation mechanisms model exist but are not
  adapted to EMC prediction approach
• Reliability statistical, physical, transistor
  level models
• EMC macro models
• How to introduce aging parameters in standard EMC
  model ?

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Publications on EMR

• A. C. Ndoye, S. Bendhia, A. Boyer, L. Guillot, B.
  Vrignon, Integrated circuits electromagnetic
  behaviour drift after accelerated ageing ,
  ICCDCS 08, Cancun, April 2008
• A. C. Ndoye, S. Bendhia, A. Boyer, L. Guillot, B.
  Vrignon, Dérives du Spectre dEmission dun
  Composant Mixte après Vieillissement Accéléré ,
  CEM08, Paris, Mai 2008
• A. Boyer, S. Bendhia, Fiabilité des Circuits
  Intégrés face aux Agressions Electromagnétiques
  , ANADEF 2008, Port dAlbret, June 2008
• S. Bendhia, A. C. Ndoye, A. Boyer, L. Guillot, B.
  Vrignon, IC Emission spectrum drifts after
  burn-in cycles , Asia Pacific EMC Week 2008,
  Singapore, May 2008
• A. Boyer, S. Ben Dhia, A. C. Ndoye, EMC / EMI
  issues for DSM new challenges , Long Term
  Reliability in DSM Workshop, 3rd October 2008,
  ESA, Nordjwiik, Netherlands
• A. Boyer, A. C. Ndoye, S. Ben Dhia, B. Vrignon,
  L. Guillot,  Evolution of emission spectrum
  integrated circuits after accelerated aging ,
  Compte Rendu de Physique, Elsevier, to be
  published in 2009

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Electromagnetic Robustness Aging Effect