© 2014 IJIRT | Volume 1 Issue 7 | ISSN: 2349-6002
IJIRT 101234 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF INNOVATIVE RESEARCH IN TECHNOLOGY 312
THERMAL ANALYSIS OF SEMICONDUCTOR
SYSTEMS
Swati Sharma, Manish Kumar, Rohan Chaudhary
Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering
Dronacharya College of Engineering,Gurgaon
Abstract- Designing a cost competitive power electronics
system requires careful consideration of the thermal
domain as well as the electrical domain. Similarly, over
designing the system adds unnecessary cost and weight;
under designing the system may lead to overheating and
even system failure. Finding an optimized solution
requires a good understanding of how to predict the
operating temperatures of the system’s power
components and how the heat generated by those
components affects neighboring devices, such as
capacitors and microcontrollers. No single thermal
analysis tool or technique works best in all situations.
Good thermal assessments require a combination of
analytical calculations using thermal specifications,
empirical analysis and thermal modeling. The art of
thermal analysis involves using all available tools to
support each other and validate their conclusions. This
paper first presents the basic principles of thermal
systems and then describes some of the techniques and
tools needed to
complete such an analysis. Power devices and low lead
count packages are the primary focus, but the concepts
herein are general and can be applied to lower power
components and higher lead count devices such as
microcontrollers.
Index Terms- Die-attach performance, Raman -
Thermography, FEA
I. INTRODUCTION
The basic principles of thermal analysis are similar to
those in the electrical domain. Understanding one
domain simplifies the task of becoming proficient in
the other. This is especially clear when we consider
thermal conduction. The two other thermal transport
mechanisms are discussed later. Each domain has a
“through” and an “across” variable.The variable can
be thought of as the
parameter that flows from one reference point to
another. Current is the variable for the electrical
domain and power is the through variable in the
thermal domain.
The across variable can be thought of as the variable
that forces the flow of current or heat. In each domain
the forcing function is a difference in potential; in
one domain it’s temperature and in the other it’s
voltage. Both systems have a resistance that impedes
the flow of the through variable. Given the duality of
the two systems, it is no surprise that the fundamental
equations of the domains are similar.The white paper
describes about convection and radiation , thermal
responses,thermal modeling and empirical
measurements and thermal modeling software.
FIG 1:- FUNDAMENTALS RELATIONSHIPS
IN THE THERMAL AND ELECTRICAL
DOMAINS
1.1 TRANSIENT THERMAL RESPONSE
The duality extends to transient as well as steady
state conditions. The existence of capacitance in both
domains results in thermal RC responses like those
we are familiar with in the electrical domain.
Thermal time constant is equal to the thermal R-C
product, that is:
tQ = RQ CQ
(Eq. 2)
Thermal capacitance is a function of the temperature
rise associated with
a given quantity of applied energy. The equation for
thermal capacitance
is:
CQ= q t/ΔT
(Eq. 3)
where:
q = heat transfer per second (J/s)
t = time (s)