Slotted contacts for minimizing the voltage required to electrically blow fuses

摘要

Electrical fuses buried inside a multi-layered structure are programmed by remotely applying a voltage to the fuses from the uppermost layer of the structure. The fuse pads, which are integral to the fuse, are stacked with conductive pads to provide an electrical path between the fuse and the uppermost layer. The dimensions of the conductive pads are equivalent to the fuse pads. This configuration significantly reduces the voltage required to program electrical fuses buried inside a multi-layered structure. In a second embodiment of the invention, the conductive pads are replaced with conductive stripes, each stripe shorting one of the two pads of each fuse. By stacking the stripes one on top of the other, a conductive vertical wall is formed from the layer where the fuses are located to the top surface. This configuration reduces the voltage required to blow selected ones of the fuses to an even lower value.