Test generation for maximizing ground bounce considering circuit delay

In this paper, we focus on the aspect of ground bounce due to the combination of current produced by gates (signals) switching and the flow of this current through pin electronics. We present a branch-and-bound test generation procedure to obtain high quality 2-vector tests that produce a large amount of ground bounce. We present a framework that accurately captures the relationship between a test and the associated relative size of the maximum amount of ground bounce while taking into account gate delay. Experimental results show that our search procedure can efficiently and effectively find a test that produces the maximum value of ground bounce. We also discuss a binary search based approach that allows our search to cover a larger portion of the search space and find a good test in a reduced amount of CPU time.

[1]  Melvin A. Breuer,et al.  Test generation for maximizing ground bounce for internal circuitry with reconvergent fan-outs , 2001, Proceedings 19th IEEE VLSI Test Symposium. VTS 2001.

[2]  K. Cheng,et al.  Vector Generation For Maximum Instantaneous Current Through Supply Lines For CMOS Circuits , 1997, Proceedings of the 34th Design Automation Conference.

[3]  Yi-Min Jiang,et al.  Estimation of maximum power and instantaneous current using a genetic algorithm , 1997, Proceedings of CICC 97 - Custom Integrated Circuits Conference.

[4]  Kwang-Ting Cheng,et al.  Exact and approximate estimation for maximum instantaneous current of CMOS circuits , 1998, Proceedings Design, Automation and Test in Europe.

[5]  Melvin A. Breuer,et al.  Test generation for ground bounce in internal logic circuitry , 1999, Proceedings 17th IEEE VLSI Test Symposium (Cat. No.PR00146).

[6]  Ibrahim N. Hajj,et al.  Maximum current estimation in CMOS circuits , 1992, [1992] Proceedings 29th ACM/IEEE Design Automation Conference.

[7]  Melvin A. Breuer,et al.  A new framework for static timing analysis, incremental timing refinement, and timing simulation , 2000, Proceedings of the Ninth Asian Test Symposium.