Thermal Sensitivity of Dielectric Materials in High-Speed Designs

At high-speeds, careful analysis is required at the design stage to ensure robust signal integrity (SI) in high-speed printed circuit boards (PCBs). Signal loss in PCBs is predominantly due to conductor loss, dielectric loss and impedance mismatch. In this paper, thermal impact on loss and impedance is studied. In that, thermal sensitivity for standard loss, mid-loss, low-loss and ultra-low loss dielectric materials is studied. It is observed that ultra-low loss materials are less sensitive as compared to standard loss materials. Also, thermal impact on impedance and loss in transmission lines, vias and SMT pads is analyzed.