Patent ID: 8114686

Claim:
A method of measuring an operating temperature of a semiconductor chip comprising: characterizing temperature dependency of the resistivity of an amorphous phase change material and generating a fitting function; designing and manufacturing a semiconductor circuit having a block of said amorphous phase change material and current measurement capability through said block; subjecting said semiconductor chip to an operating condition and measuring an operating condition current through said block; calculating an operation condition resistivity from said measured operating condition current; and calculating a temperature at which said fitting function generates said calculated operating condition resistivity, wherein said semiconductor circuit includes a semiconductor structure comprising: a semiconductor device including a component located within a semiconductor substrate, wherein said component comprises a same semiconductor material as said semiconductor substrate, said block of said amorphous phase change material contacting a surface of said component and embedded in a dielectric layer located over said semiconductor substrate; a first metal contact that is in direct contact with one portion of said block and embedded in said dielectric layer; and a second metal contact that is in direct contact with another portion of said block and embedded in said dielectric layer.