INTEGRATED TEMPERATURE SENSORS FOR ONLINE THERMAL MONITORING OF MICROELECTRONIC STRUCTURES

Built-in temperature sensors increase the system reliability by predic ting eventual faults caused by excessive chip temperatures. In this pa per, simple and efficient built-in temperature sensors for the on-line thermal monitoring of microelectronics structures are introduced. The proposed temperature sensors produce a signal oscillating at a freque ncy proportional to the temperature of the microelectronics structure and therefore they are compatible to the oscillation-test method. The oscillation-test method is a low-cost and robust test method for mixed -signal integrated circuits based on transforming the circuit under te st (CUT) to an oscillator. This paper presents the design and detailed characteristics of the sensors proposed based on the CMOS 1.2 mu m te chnology parameters of Mitel S.C.C. Extensive post-layout simulations show that the oscillation frequency is very sensitive to temperature v ariations. The sensors proposed require very small power dissipation a nd silicon area.