Products: Circuit Scan 1000

Circuit Scan 1000: Informational Links

CS1000 On-line Video Demonstration

CS1000 Frequently Asked Questions

CS1000 Product Brochure (PDF Format)

Circuit Scan 1000: Case Studies

Case study 1: Power-to-ground short circuit

Case study 2: Quantitative analysis of current flow

Case study 3: Sub-micron die-level current mapping

Circuit Scan 1000: General Description

Operating circuits within a semiconductor generate external magnetic fields near the surface of the device. These magnetic fields, while weak in strength, contain information about the spatial variation of current density flowing within the circuit. Micro Magnetics has developed the CS1000 to make practical use of this information and provide engineers with valuable information about what is going on inside circuitry non-destructively.

The Circuit Scan 1000 is a scanning magnetic microscope capable of capturing external magnetic fields generated by an operating circuit, and then analyzing these fields to provide a map of the current density distribution, with a spatial resolution on the order of tens of nanometers. The system uses a proprietary, ultra-sensitive magnetic sensor technology with deep sub-micron spatial resolution, the technology for which was initially developed in the Nanoscale Physics and Devices group at Brown University.

The CS1000 maps currents at extremely small scales through any dielectric or nonferrous overlayers, and has superior linear response over the full signal range seen in integrated circuits. Our proprietary magnetic sensors have a wide frequency response (0-5 GHz), and are thermally stable, requiring no special environmental controls. Additionally, they have outstanding spatial resolution, resolving features to date as small as 60 nanometers, a feature size well below the current state-of-the-art in the semiconductor industry.

The system is designed to be straight-forward and easy to use. Some of the features which come standard on the CS1000 are full optical and/or NIR navigation and ROI selection, automatic field and current density map overlay, sample surface detection and mapping, automatic sample tilt and contour correction, five distinct contact and non-contact scanning modes, a small-footprint vertical sensing probe, intuitive image stitching, a “Repeat Scan” function to automatically vary parameters, and a full set of calibration functions.

The system also includes our powerful VIsta stand-alone analysis package, which features flexible data display and interpretation, a quantitative analysis package for extraction of all relevant current parameters (including current amplitude and conductor width and depth), two powerful current density conversion algorithms, compact data file formats, exporting of data and images to common file formats, an image comparison and subtraction suite, and automatic overlay of magnetic and current density maps.

Please see the links above for more information about the CS1000 or contact us directly at Sales@micromagnetics.com with any questions. To see some images produced by the CS1000, please visit our image library.

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