The Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IIT-Bombay) has entered a strategic partnership with Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) to develop India’s first Quantum Diamond Microchip Imager.
- This advanced sensing tool will hold the potential to unlock new levels of precision in the examination of semiconductor chips, reduce chip failures and improve the energy efficiency of electronic devices.
- Over the next two years, experts from TCS will work with Dr. Kasturi Saha, Associate Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering of IIT Bombay, to develop the quantum imaging platform in the PQuest Lab.
- This platform will enable better quality control of semiconductor chips, thereby improving product reliability, safety, and energy efficiency of electrical devices.
Quantum Diamond Microchip Imager: Uses
- The Quantum Diamond Microchip Imager can image magnetic fields, enabling a non-invasive and non-destructive mapping of semiconductor chips, much like an MRI at a hospital.
- It uses the defects in a diamond’s structure, known as Nitrogen-Vacancy (NV) centres, together with the other hardware and software for detecting and characterizing anomalies in semiconductor chips.
- The diagnostic capabilities will have significant implications for failure analysis, device development, and various optimisation processes.
- With its advanced capabilities to identify chip defects such as current leakages and enable visualisation of three-dimensional charge flow in multi-layer chips, Quantum Diamond Microchip Imager is a leap forward in semiconductor imaging.
- It will have wide applications in microelectronics, biological, and geological imaging, and fine-scale imaging of magnetic fields, among others.
Semiconductor chips
- Semiconductor chips are essential to all modern electronic devices, making them smart and efficient.
- With the ability to process data and complete tasks, these chips act as the brains of devices across industries such as communications, computing, healthcare, military systems, transportation and clean energy.
