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Buehler Education Schedule
CALCE (Center for Advanced Life Cycle Engineering - University of Maryland) / Buehler
Failure Analysis of Electronic Components
CALCE / BUEHLER FAILURE
ANALYSIS OF ELECTRONIC
COMPONENTS
Failure analysis is an important tool in the
effort to ensure reliability of electronic
products and systems throughout their
product lifecycle. Significant
improvements in the reliability of
electronics can be achieved by retrieving
products and examining them to
determine the root cause of any failures
and the extent of degradation which has
occurred over time. Root cause failure
analysis employs a sequence of
non-destructive and destructive
analytical techniques to characterize the
modes by which failure is manifested, the
sites where failure is localized, the
fundamental mechanical, electrical,
chemical and electrochemical
mechanisms by which failure has
occurred, and the factors which
precipitated the activation of those
mechanisms.
Unfortunately, failure analysis is often
performed incorrectly or incompletely,
leading to a poor understanding of failure
mechanisms and causes, and loss of
money, customers, and possibly lives due
to recurrence of failures. The first half of
the short course will present a
methodology for identifying potential
failure mechanisms in electronic
components based on the failure history.
Systematic approaches to root cause
analysis will be provided. Failure analysis
techniques geared towards various failure
mechanisms will be discussed, with an
emphasis on cross-sectioning techniques
and analysis.
Cross-sectional analysis is a valuable tool
for failure analysis of electronic devices
along with quality evaluation, research
and process monitoring. Successful use of
this technique is often complicated by the
highly dissimilar properties of the
component materials under investigation
and their susceptibility to damage.
Emphasis will be placed on how to deal
with these differences through an
understanding of the component
materials to be prepared and the basic
principles of abrasive grinding and
polishing. Techniques for low-damage
sectioning and the procedures required to
prevent preparation induced damage are
discussed.
The second half of this short course
provides guidance on how to choose
preparation sequences depending on the
materials, the configuration of the
specimens and the ultimate purpose of
the investigation. The short course stresses
the need to understand the basic
principles rather than simply following
'“recipes". The goal of specimen
preparation is to produce a damage-free
surface that can be imaged and analyzed
through the use of microscopy. Methods
for capturing images and quantifying
features through the use of image analysis
will be discussed and demonstrated. This
course is recommended for persons who
wish to conduct failure analysis on
electronic products such as PWBs, wafers,
solid state devices and components.
This course will be taught jointly by Center
for Advanced Life Cycle Engineering
(CALCE) and Buehler.
April 26-29, 2011
(CALCE - University of Maryland)
September 13-16, 2011
(CALCE - University of Maryland)
COST:
4-day course:
$2500
Consortium Members &
Government Institutions:
$2000
Each attendee is invited to submit one
sample to CALCE at least three weeks
before the start date. Several of the
submitted samples will be prepared and
analyzed in advance, for use during the
demonstrations. Other samples will be
used for hands-on training to illustrate
specimen preparation procedures and
analysis techniques. However, no
guarantee can be offered that any specific
sample will be used. All unused samples
will be returned.
For course registration information
please contact Bhanu Sood by phone at
301-405-3498 or by email at
bpsood@calce.umd.edu.
52 Effective 2011