Physical fault isolation of complex BEOL defects in advanced microprocessors using EBAC technique in nano-prober

Electron beam absorbed current (EBAC) has been used to isolate defects in BEOL metal stacks. With the increasing layout complexity, metal signal lines often run over 100um area and over multiple metal stacks. This makes SEM inspections during polishing tedious, time consuming and easy to overlook the defect. With the EBAC technique, it often shows the entire routing of the signal line with additional or absence that can pinpoint or narrow the location of the defects. In this paper, we will show how the Kleindiek system is used to perform the EBAC technique and locate the BEOL defect.