On-Wafer Measurement System for the Analysis of Integrated Submillimeter-Wave Circuits

乌尔姆大学电子设备和电路研究所的一个中心研究重点是研究和研究极宽带传感器和通信系统的电路和集成系统概念。在这两个领域，目标是在高度集成和成本效益高的集成电路技术(主要是硅锗)的基础上，实现高载频，以实现前所未有的基带带宽、最大的数据速率和最高的传感分辨率。进入亚毫米波区域的载波频率的进一步增加和相对带宽近似恒定的绝对带宽的直接增加使精密小型化雷达传感器、气体传感和材料表征等光谱学应用领域取得重大进展。这些极高带宽的使用进一步允许未来以超过100Gbaud/s的巨大数据速率进行无线通信。所设计的集成收发器及其电路构建块的表征，以及传播路径的材料参数和高频传递函数的确定，需要相应的亚毫米波S参数探测形式的测量技术。对于有源集成电路，它需要包括确定噪声、线性度和信号质量的其他可能性。除此之外，测量站需要遵循现代电路实施趋势，并以变频测量为特色。表征直接在所设计IC的焊盘上执行，特别是在单个构建块上，并且需要测量设备与高频晶片上探针站的共同实施和兼容性。

A central research focus of the Institute of Electronic Devices and Circuits at Ulm University is the research and investigation of circuits and integrated system concepts for extremely broadband sensors and communication systems. In both areas, the goal is to realization of high carrier frequencies for the realization of unprecedented baseband bandwidths far maximum data rates and highest sensing resolutions on the basis of highly-integrated and cost-efficient integrated circuit technology (mainly silicon-germanium). A further increase in carrier frequencies into the submillimeter-wave regime and the directly linked increase of absolute bandwidth for approximately constant relative bandwidths enables significant progress in the area of precision miniaturized radar sensors, spectroscopy applications such as gas sensing and material characterization. The use of these extremely high bandwidths further allows future wireless communication with huge data rates beyond 100 Gbaud/s.The characterization of designed integrated transceivers and their circuit building blocks, as well as the determination of material parameters and high-frequency transfer functions of propagations paths necessitates corresponding measurement technology in the form of submillimeter-wave S-parameter probing. For the active integrated circuits, it needs to include additional possibilities for the determination of noise, linearity, and signal quality. Beyond that, the measurement station needs to obey modern circuit implementation trends and feature frequency-converting measurements. The characterization is performed directly at the pads of the designed ICs, and especially single building blocks, and necessitates a co-implementation and compatibility of the measurement equipment with a high-frequency on-wafer probe station.