Temperature-Gradient Based Burn-In for 3D Stacked ICs
The 12th Swedish System-on-Chip Conference (SSoCC 2013), Ystad, Sweden, May 6-7, 2013 (not reviewed, not printed).
3D Stacked IC fabrication, using Through-Silicon-Vias, is a promising technology for future integrated circuits. However, large temperature gradients may exacerbate early-life-failures to the extent that the commercialization of 3D Stacked ICs is challenged. The effective detection of these early-life-failures requires that burn-in is performed when the ICís temperatures comply with the thermal maps that properly specify the temperature gradients. In this paper, two methods that efficiently generate and maintain the specified thermal maps are proposed. The thermal maps are achieved by applying heating and cooling intervals to the chips under test through test access mechanisms. Therefore, no external heating system is required. The scheduling of the heating and cooling intervals is based on thermal simulations. The schedule generation is guided by functions that are derived from the temperature equations. Experimental results demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed method.
[APE13] Nima Aghaee, Zebo Peng, Petru Eles, "Temperature-Gradient Based Burn-In for 3D Stacked ICs", The 12th Swedish System-on-Chip Conference (SSoCC 2013), Ystad, Sweden, May 6-7, 2013 (not reviewed, not printed).