The Fundamentals of Nanoprobe Analysis
The Fundamentals of Nanoprobe Analysis
Sunday, November 16, 2025: 1:30 PM
1 (Pasadena Convention Center)
Summary:
Nanoprobing is now a mature technology platform. How these systems are constructed and run and perform their analysis techniques has been well established since the early 2000s in technical papers and articles. The training for the functional operation of the nanoprobe tools themselves is provided by the tool vendor or by experienced analysts already trained and practiced in running the tool. There is no need to repeat this information in this tutorial. Instead, the purpose of this paper will be to address the ancillary issues regarding the nanoprobing and characterization of transistors, probing copper metallization layers, and the various imaging techniques. These ancillary issues and strategies are vital for quickly and successfully obtaining the required results needed to determine device failure. If these issues are not addressed properly, achieving any type of meaningful results will be much more difficult if not impossible.
Nanoprobing is now a mature technology platform. How these systems are constructed and run and perform their analysis techniques has been well established since the early 2000s in technical papers and articles. The training for the functional operation of the nanoprobe tools themselves is provided by the tool vendor or by experienced analysts already trained and practiced in running the tool. There is no need to repeat this information in this tutorial. Instead, the purpose of this paper will be to address the ancillary issues regarding the nanoprobing and characterization of transistors, probing copper metallization layers, and the various imaging techniques. These ancillary issues and strategies are vital for quickly and successfully obtaining the required results needed to determine device failure. If these issues are not addressed properly, achieving any type of meaningful results will be much more difficult if not impossible.