Thermo-mechanical Analysis and Fatigue Life Prediction for Integrated Circuits (ICs)

This paper evaluates the thermal and thermo-mechanical behavior of a packaged sensor interface embedding several high and low-voltage integrated circuits (ICs). The main objective of this study is to apply a numerical procedure to evaluate the fatigue strength of the layers and materials that, in general, represent one of the weakest parts of integrated electronic devices. Simulations performed with COMSOL Multiphysics® under stable boundary conditions at 25 °C up to 70 °C and transient conditions allow to estimate and plot the thermal map of the embedded ICs. Thermal stresses and their transient distributions are obtained. In addition, the deformations are evaluated to predict the number of cycles until failure of the constituent layers.