Periodic Reporting for period 2 - INLINETEST (In-line quality inspection system for smart production of micro and nanoelectronic components)
Période du rapport: 2019-07-01 au 2021-11-30
The consortium consists of 5 partners from 3 European countries and integrates competence from 1 big company, 3 SMEs and 1 university. Moreover, three global players in micro/nano-electronics in Europe accompany this endeavor on the board of industrial advisors. In this way, INLINETEST project will make use of all partners’ complementary competencies and push the technology a big leap forward to the market.
Propagating thermal waves probe the heat path in the component which is determined by the material structure properties. Aberrations or anomalies can thus be made visible by recording the thermal signature of the component (surface temperature over time) as response. The methods used for recording, PIRT or TR, are complementary in the sense that PIRT is sensitive for non-reflective surfaces (e.g. encapsulated components) whereas the other, TR, is sensitive to reflective surfaces. So many stages in the production process can be monitored. One major advantage is that the equipment probes exactly those flaws which are responsible for a later failure by the same physical effect of high temperature. So the thermal contrast detected is physically very motivated and justified and better suited than other methods, e.g. acoustic reflection or absorption of radiation. Further, cooling down time (tens of seconds) after processing can ideally be used for thermographic methods as it is not used otherwise.
The in-line inspection systems based on combined PIRT and TR will be demonstrated in a real industrial environment on a production run featuring a large number of micro/nano-electronic components, exemplified on power multi-chip modules from the industrial sectors of RF systems (GaN) and automotive (Si), as well as a sintering process.