title: Location of hot spots in integrated circuits by monitoring the substrate thermal-phase lag with the mirage effect.
abstract: This Letter presents a solution for locating hot spots in active integrated circuits (IC) and devices. This method is based on sensing the phase lag between the power periodically dissipated by a device integrated in an IC (hot spot) and its corresponding thermal gradient into the chip substrate by monitoring the heat-induced refractive index gradient with a laser beam. The experimental results show a high accuracy and prove the suitability of this technique to locate and characterize devices behaving as hot spots in current IC technologies.
authors.affiliation: Institut de Microelectrònica de Barcelona IMB-CNM (CSIC), Campus de la Universitat Autonomade Barcelona, 08193 Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain. xavier.perpinya@imb-cnm.csic.es
authors.forename: Xavier
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Perpiñà
authors.forename: Josep
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Altet
authors.forename: Xavier
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Jordà
authors.forename: Miquel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Vellvehi
authors.forename: Narcís
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Mestres