IC SEM Reverse Engineering Tutorial Using Artificial Intelligence

Editor’s notes: Reverse engineering modern complex integrated circuits (ICs) relies on extracting as much helpful information as possible, which requires extensive imaging technology support. One of the key imaging methods, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), offers macroscale resolution values and a wide range of magnification. This tutorial shows how artificial intelligence (AI) techniques facilitate reverse engineering of an IC based on SEM. —Umit Ogras, University of Wisconsin, USA