Reliability

Research conducted in the Reliability group is very interdisciplinary dealing with electrical devices, electronics, materials science, modelling, and reliability study. In the following the main areas of the studies are presented.

Materials

The requirements for both functionality and reliability in electrical devices electronics have increased. At the same time also the demands for the materials in these applications have increased. Often traditional materials used in these applications are not able to meet the increased demands and new materials are needed.
In the Reliability group materials used in interconnections, packages, and devices are studied. The interconnection materials include electrically conductive adhesives and solders. Additionally, properties of printed circuit board, glob top, moulding, and coating materials are studied. Furthermore, materials used in electronics components are studied in the group. One of the group’s interests is changes in the properties of materials under various environments.

Reliability study

Reliability is a critical factor for an electronics product. During recent years its significance has further increased. Reliability can be studied using modelling and various reliability tests.
In the Reliability group reliability of electronics interconnections, components, and devices is studied using accelerated environmental testing. The studied testing condition include for example thermal cycling, high humidity, high temperature, and salt fog. In addition to these, mechanical testing such as vibration and drop testing are used. In important part of the research is development of new more efficient test methods. These include various combinatory tests to better describe the actual use conditions.
An important part of the study is failure analysis. The aim is to understand how failure occurs and to find their causes. In the reliability group failure mechanisms have been studied for interconnections, packaging and coating materials, electronics components and whole devices.
 

Miniaturization

Currently, the trend is for smaller electronics with increased amount of functionality even in many power electronics applications. This causes demand for miniaturized products. In the Reliability group miniaturization has been studied using new packaging technologies. One of the studied packaging methods is flip chip technology which enables very high pitch packaging. Additionally, various flexible substrates and flex on board technologies have been studied.

Contact person: Dr.Tech. Laura Frisk