Electron Beam Testing Techniques have gained widespread acceptance throughout the electronics industry in the design verification of prototypes and the failure analysis of production devices. In the past, these techniques have gained little prominence, with the micro-prober being the main tool used during the diagnostic process. The increasing integration of modern semiconductors has resulted in the mechanical prober effectively becoming obsolete due to the capacitive loading that these 1μm probes introduce. The need for an integrated diagnostic system also becomes greater with the increasing complexity of devices. In particular, the tools required to perform a successful analysis include the design database, test stimulus and an electron beam testing system. The most effective way to create the required debug environment is to integrate all the isolated tools involved around a centralised host. This work involves the development of an integrated electron beam test system which meets the specific industrial requirements of a failure analysis facility. This system is based around a workstation which provides complete control of all aspects of the debug environment. A particular problem identified with this system was the susceptibility of the secondary electron detector to local field effects. The design and development of a new electron detector allowed a significant improvement in the quantitative measurement accuracy of the system to be demonstrated. Image processing algorithms were shown to have applications both in the improvement of picture quality and the manipulation of acquired images. A novel approach was introduced for the identification of chosen features on the device. The application of the developed system in the debug of complex VLSI devices is demonstrated with several failure mechanisms being uncovered.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:653844 |
| Date | January 1989 |
| Creators | Levy, Lionel A. |
| Publisher | University of Edinburgh |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Source | http://hdl.handle.net/1842/12410 |
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