Substrate induced signal integrity in 2D and 3D ICs

Silicon substrate represents a common medium for a large number of transistors integrated to form a monolithic die. Since silicon is a semiconducting material, the signals injected into the substrate propagate throughout the die and can disturb the operation of highly sensitive circuits through multiple mechanisms. This phenomenon, typically referred to as substrate noise coupling, should be considered during the design and verification stages of a traditional flow to avoid substrate noise induced failures or performance degradations. In small-scale circuits with number of transistors in the range of several hundreds, substrate coupling noise can be analyzed by extracting the substrate and simulating the extracted substrate with the switching circuit.