Effective techniques for automatically improving the transition delay fault coverage of Self-Test Libraries

Abstract

In-field test of integrated circuits using Self-Test Libraries (STLs) is a widely used technique specifically suited to guarantee the processor's correct behavior during the operative lifetime, as mandated by functional safety standards such as ISO26262. Developing STLs for stuck-at faults requires significant manual efforts from test engineers, and targeting delay faults is even more challenging. In order to support this process, in this paper we propose a method to automate the creation of STLs targeting delay faults starting from existing STLs targeting stuck-at faults. The method is based first on identifying excited but not-observed transition delay faults and then adding suitable instructions able to observe (and hence detect) them. Experimental results on a RISC-V processor show that the method can systematically detect a significant percentage of the target faults with reasonable computational effort and test code size increase.