Patent ID: 7659981
Filing Date: 2010-02-09
Classification: G01R

Abstract:
1. A system for investigating the operation of a transistor in an integrated circuit microchip using laser probing, comprising: a laser source providing a laser beam; a beam optics comprising a polarizer polarizing said beam in a vertical direction so as to provide a vertically polarized beam, and a rotator rotating said vertically polarized beam through a predetermined angle so as to provide a polarized-rotated beam consisting of a vertically polarized component and a horizontally polarized component; an optical retarder positioned to receive the polarized-rotated beam and retard one of said vertically and horizontally polarized components with respect to the other; a beam pointing optics receiving said polarized-rotated beam from the optical retarder and transmitting said vertically and horizontally polarized components along the same optical path while pointing the vertically and horizontally polarized components onto the transistor in alignment with the gate length and gate width of the transistor and; a first photodetector receiving at least a portion of reflected laser light that is reflected from said microchip and providing an electrical signal; collection electronics receiving the electrical signal from said photodetector and providing an output signal; an analysis system receiving and analyzing said output signal.