Novel Approach to Circuit Board Testing

This paper describes research and development efforts in the application of nanoscale sensors to implement an original method for bed-of-needles testing for printed circuit boards testing. This approach performs functional testing that eliminates the need to have a pre-existing model of a circuit board while automating much of the development process. The general concept involves creating arrays of nanoscale sensor probes , using molecular electronics for incorporating test instruments and computing logic for test interpretation directly into a pod consisting of multiple nails, and distributing these pods across the face and back of a circuit card using a contact fixture. The resulting test approach exhibits massive parallelism combined with extremely compact size that facilitates novel testing approaches not possible with current generation or planned test equipment. In consequence, many existing limitations are expected to be overcome with test speed and accuracy significantly improved.