Exploiting logic simulation to improve simulation-based sequential ATPG

The constantly increasing circuit size makes the sequential ATPG problem a challenging area even when simulation-based algorithms are exploited. Several techniques have been proposed which mainly resort to logic simulation, reverting to fault simulation only when strictly required. In this paper we present a new Genetic Algorithm-based test generation method which exploits information coming from a logic simulator (e.g., the circuit activity and the reached states) to guide the search process, in particular in the fault excitation phase. Experimental results show the effectiveness of the proposed method when compared with other Genetic Algorithm-based test generators.