On-die Measurement Research Articles

Development of a Device for On-Die Double-Pulse Testing and Measurement of Dynamic On-Resistance of GaN HEMTs

On-die testing can accelerate development of semiconductor devices, but poses certain challenges related to high frequency and high current switching. This paper describes design and development of a tester for double-pulse switching test and measurement of dynamic on-state resistance of unpackaged High-Electron-Mobility Transistors (GaN HEMTs). The tester is capable of switching an inductive load at drain-to-source voltage up to 400 V and drain current up to 10 A. Design challenges resulting from specific properties of GaN HEMTs and on-die measurement are explained, and solutions are proposed. Essential parts of the developed device are described, including low inductance gate-driver and measurement methods. Modified drain voltage clamping circuit for accurate on-state drain voltage measurement is described. The tester is constructed as a printed circuit board, integrated into a probe station. Voltage and current waveforms are measured with oscilloscope and used to calculate the on-resistance. Results of a reference measurement with commercially available packaged transistors are presented. Waveforms measured on experimental unpackaged normally-off GaN HEMT samples are also presented and discussed. The proposed tester device proved to be capable of performing the dynamic on-resistance measurement with satisfactory results.

Ultralow-Power Radar Sensors for Ambient Sensing in the ${V}$ -Band

The design considerations and circuit topologies of a family of ultralow-power fundamental-frequency and second-harmonic 60-GHz radar sensors are described. The single-chip sensor architecture features four low-noise-matched receivers, either a fundamental-frequency 60-GHz voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) or 30-GHz VCO + doubler, and a static divide-by-8192 chain which is turned OFF 95% of the time to save DC power. On-die measurements show a power consumption of 42 mW from a single 1.2-V supply, 10% frequency tuning range, −104 to −108 dBc/Hz phase noise at 10-MHz offset, 10-dB conversion gain per receiver, and −7-dBm transmitter output power at the antenna pads. Several 45-nm SOI-CMOS sensor dies were flip-chip mounted on a $7\times 7$ mm2 flexible interposer which also includes four receive- and two transmit antennas. Doppler and direction of arrival tests were conducted over distances of several tens of centimeters.

Local Oscillations of On-Die Supply Voltage—A Reliability Issue

On-die measurements of <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">V</i> <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">DD</sub> and <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">V</i> <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">SS</sub> voltages inside a 90-nm VLSI technology chip are presented. The results show local fluctuations in the <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">V</i> <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">DD</sub> and <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">V</i> <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">SS</sub> voltages with amplitudes that can reach, in severe cases, more than 10% of <i xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">V</i> <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">DD</sub> . These fluctuations can distort analog signals, cause immediate logic faults, and also aggravate other reliability wear-out mechanisms. Both measurements and simulations predict the aggravation of this phenomenon for future technologies.