Design and characterization of magnetically coupled on-chip current probe for monitoring switching current in chip I/O PDN

Cho, Changhyun; Kim, J. J.; Kim, Joungho; Pak, Jun So

doi:10.1109/edaps.2012.6469422

Cited by 5 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 3 publications

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“…SSC is typically obtained by simulating the switching activity of the logic gates in SPICE-like tools, but this can be very inefficient and time consuming due to scalability issues and limited accuracy. There have been a number of researches conducted in the past on the current probing structures [3]- [5]; however, the previous structures were fabricated and analyzed on Printed Circuit Board (PCB) level only and TSV-based current probing structures have never been fabricated.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

TSV-based current probing structure using magnetic coupling in 2.5D and 3D IC

Kim

Jung

Kim

et al. 2015

2015 10th International Workshop on the Electromagnetic Compatibility of Integrated Circuits (EMC Compo)

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Simultaneous switching noise (SSN) is caused by the simultaneous switching of a group of I/O drivers, and isproportional to the total inductance and the rate of change of the switching current. This often leads to signal distortion and degradation of signal and power integrity of systems. Furthermore, with the continuously decreasing operating voltage, susceptibility to SSN keeps on increasing and it becomes increasingly challenging to achieve high performance interfaces. Therefore, it is highly important to perform SSN analysis in order to accurately investigate the noise and timing margin of the devices under test; hence, it is important to know the exact amount of switching current drawn by the ICs. In this paper, we propose TSV-based current probing structure using magnetic coupling, named TSV-based Current Probe (TCP). By capturing the magnetic flux induced by the injected current and processing it through a series of reconstruction steps, we can obtain the original current waveform of interest. Through a series of simulations in frequency and time domains, we verify the performance of the proposed probing structure, TCP. Lastly, TCP is fabricated using TSV fabrication techniques and measured for experimental verification.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

TSV-based current probing structure using magnetic coupling in 2.5D and 3D IC

Kim

Jung

Kim

et al. 2015

2015 10th International Workshop on the Electromagnetic Compatibility of Integrated Circuits (EMC Compo)

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“…Through analysis of the transfer impedance between the two coils, I injected can be obtained by measuring and analyzing V induced . Many researches on the current probe have been conducted in the past, mainly using Rogowski-type toroidal structure [9]- [12]. However, the previous structures were fabricated on Printed Circuit Board (PCB) level only, and on-chip current probes have not been investigated, nor has it been fully integrated in a system with I/O buffers to measure the on-chip SSC.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Chip-Level Simultaneous Switching Current Measurement in Power Distribution Network Using Magnetically Coupled Embedded Current Probing Structure

Kim

Cho

Bae

et al. 2014

IEEE Trans. Compon., Packag. Manufact. Technol.

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A simultaneous switching current (SSC) drawn by an integrated circuit (IC) creates simultaneous switching noise on power nets, which in turn causes jitters in the I/O signals and reduces the maximum clock frequency. For a thorough analysis of high-speed ICs, there is a dire need to measure currents at specific power pins of the ICs. In this paper, a novel magnetically coupled embedded current probing structure is proposed for measuring the SSC on the chip level resulting from the logical activity of the I/O buffers. SSCs are found by capturing the magnetic flux induced by the SSC of interest, with the proposed embedded current probing structure using magnetic coupling, and then reconstructing the original current waveform using the transfer impedance profile. Through a series of measurements with test vehicles fabricated on the chip level, we experimentally verified the proposed probing structures in the time and frequency domains and proved that they can effectively measure the SSC. Finally, future directions for improvements are discussed at the end of this paper.

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