Testing of ultra low voltage VLSI chips using the superconducting single-photon detector (SSPD)

In this paper we discuss the use of the Superconducting Single-Photon Detector (SSPD) [1] in the framework of the Picosecond Imaging Circuit Analysis (PICA) [2] technique for testing chips by extracting electrical waveforms, propagation delays and skews. An IBM microprocessor fabricated in a 0.13 μm technology with 1.2 V nominal supply voltage VDD will be used as a benchmark for characterizing the detector and evaluating its applicability to future technologies with low VDD and high frequency clocks. © 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.