Multiphysics approach using computational fluid dynamics for signal integrity analysis in high speed serial links

Abstract

Historically, signal integrity (SI) modeling and analysis was performed standalone without considering nonelectrical aspects of the design. Going forward, this approach may not be viable to model high-speed serial links. Increased demand for higher CPU core count is resulting in higher wattage CPUs. This in-turn is increasing the number of phases of voltage regulator module (VRM) driving higher thermal footprint for the design. Increase in temperature impacts highspeed interconnect performance adversely. Modeling interconnects for worst-case operating temperature can be unrealistic and could lead to over-design of a channel. In this paper, a Multiphysics approach is proposed to model next generation high-speed interconnects. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) is used to determine the temperature gradient in the channel and thermo-electrical co-analysis is proposed to accurately predict the interconnect signal integrity (SI) characteristics. A realistic test case is used to demonstrate the importance of proposed Multiphysics co-analysis for different data rates.