Previous installments of this column have all dealt with situations in which the die temperature was assumed to be at a constant temperature after the system had achieved the steady state. However, there are many times in which it is useful to know how rapidly the temperature of the chip changes when the applied power changes abruptly. This month's column presents a simple … [Read more...]
Thermal joint conductance for graphite materials
The heat flow across a metal/interstitial elastic-layer/metal joint is a very important problem in many microelectronic applications. It is generally known that when two surfaces are brought together, intimate solid-to-solid contact occurs only at discrete parts of the interface. Therefore, the actual contact area of pressed surfaces represents a very small fraction of the … [Read more...]
Effects of electrical noise on thermocouple measurements
Measurements of temperature in electronic equipment and in thermal characterization apparatus are most often made with thermocouples. As with any sensor, the goal is to gather information about the environment in the vicinity of the sensor, in this case the temperature. Unfortunately the environment around the entire instrumentation chain, including the lead wires and the data … [Read more...]
Dynamic Measurements: A Cornerstone of the European PROFIT Project
This article presents an overview of a number of dynamic measurement methods as part of the European PROFIT project. Due to lack of space, details cannot be given, but the interested reader is invited to consult the references at the end of the article. Because the majority of a product's cost and performance are committed in the early phases of a design cycle, it is envisioned … [Read more...]
Dynamic Temperature Measurements: Tools Providing a Look into Package and Mount Structures
Today it is commonly accepted that dynamic thermal measurements, which have been used for more than 20 years [1], [2], [3], [4], are superior to steady-state ones. The temperature vs. time function - often called the thermal step-response function, heating curve, or thermal impedance curve - is characteristic of the chip-to-ambient structure, including even different cooling … [Read more...]
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