ECE PhD Student Wins FLEX 2024 Future Student Poster Award
Yilmaz Arin Manav, PhD’28, electrical engineering, won first place at the Innovators of the Future Student Poster Award session at FLEX 2024 (SEMICON West) for his research on “Flexible Hybrid Electronics Metrology Enabled by GHz Ultrasound.” Manav works in ECE Assistant Professor Benyamin Davaji’s Autonomous Integrated Microsystems Lab (AIM) and is a student at the Institute for NanoSystems Innovation.
This work presents the application of GHz ultrasound imaging for the metrology of material properties, defects, and stress gradient-induced warpage in additively manufactured electronics and flexible hybrid electronics. The principle of ultrasound pulse-echo reflectometry, elastography and interference phase measurements at GHz frequencies are used for detecting material properties and dimensional metrologies. The GHz ultrasound imager used in this study has a 128 x 128 array of 50-micron AlN transducers that can operate between 1-1.9 GHz for acquiring echo data at ~9-20 fps at full frame. The high spatial resolution resulting from the 50-micron pixel size and the use of GHz frequencies allow for resolving micron scale defects (cracks, scratches, bubbles, etc.), and mapping surface layer mechanical properties. These measurements also open up the possibility of imaging multilayered or buried devices for manufacturing inspection, hardware malware detection, counterfeit detection, layer adhesion quality assessment, structural failure analysis, aging assessments, and nondestructive 3-dimensional structural metrology for FHE components.