On-Wafer Measurement System for the Analysis of Integrated Broadband Circuits

乌尔姆大学电子器件和电路研究所的一个中心研究重点是研究和调查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，目标是实现前所未有的基带带宽远最大的数据速率和最高的传感分辨率的基础上，高度集成和成本效益的集成电路技术（主要是硅锗）。进一步增加可用带宽或灵活使用宽带频谱来测量通道传递函数，可以在精密小型化雷达传感器、光谱应用（如气体传感和材料表征）领域取得重大进展。这些极高带宽的使用进一步允许未来的无线短距离通信和电光接口具有显著超过100 Gbaud/s的巨大数据速率。以及材料参数和传播路径的宽带传递函数的确定，需要相应的最大宽带S-型测量技术。参数探测对于有源集成电路，它需要包括在宽带无缝频率范围内确定噪声、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现趋势，并具有两个全差分测量端口，还允许频率转换测量。表征直接在设计的IC的焊盘上进行，并且需要测量设备与高频晶圆上探针台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 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 available bandwidths or the flexible use of a broadband spectrum for the measurement of a channel transfer function enables significant progress in the area of precision miniaturized radar sensors, spectroscopy applications such as gas sensing and the characterization of materials. The use of these extremely high bandwidths further allows future wireless short-range communication and electro-optical interfaces with enormous data rates significantly beyond 100 Gbaud/s.The characterization of designed integrated transceivers and their circuit building blocks, as well as the determination of material parameters and broadband transfer functions of propagations paths necessitates corresponding measurement technology in the form of maximally broadband S-parameter probing. For the active integrated circuits, it needs to include additional possibilities for the determination of noise, linearity, and signal quality in a broadband seamless frequency range. Beyond that, the measurement station needs to obey modern circuit implementation trends and feature a two fully-differential measurement ports and further allow for frequency-converting measurements. The characterization is performed directly at the pads of the designed ICs and necessitates a co-implementation and compatibility of the measurement equipment with a high-frequency on-wafer probe station.