In this paper, the investigation process for the failure cause of tantalum capacitors is presented. The capacitors failed during the temperature/humidity testing by reversed polarization. The failed capacitors had higher leakage current. The external visual and Xray examination didn’t show any anomalous phenomena. After cross sectioning and SEM examination, it was found that silver migration is the root cause for the failures.

failure analysis, leakage current, polarization, root cause analysis, scanning electron microscope, tantalum capacitors, temperature humidity testing
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Copyright © 2001 ASM International. All rights reserved.
2001
ASM International
Topics
Capacitors Scanning electron microscopy Semiconductor wafer fabrication Root cause analysis
Issue Section:
Discretes
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