Dealing with coupling effect for accurate thermal profile prediction of BEOL interconnect in advanced technology nodes

Authors:
Open Access
Publisher website
Google Scholar
Abstract
As semiconductor technology progresses to advanced nodes, the thermal issue of back-end-of-line (BEOL) interconnect has become a critical challenge due to increased power density and reduced metal pitches. This study introduces an efficient approach for predicting the temperature distribution in BEOL interconnects featuring the consideration of thermal coupling, leveraging nanoscale thermal conductivity and the “dual-plane image heat source” equivalence method to account for severe thermal coupling effects. This approach significantly improves computational efficiency, requiring only 6% of the time of finite element simulations while maintaining high accuracy. Key findings highlight that the cross-layer thermal coupling profoundly impacts interconnect temperature profiles, particularly for emerging post-Cu materials and advanced interconnect geometries.
Funding Information
  • National Natural Science Foundation of China (T2293704, 62027818, 52476080)
  • National Key Research and Development Program of China (2023YFB4402204)

This publication has 17 references indexed in Scilit: