Integrated circuit including a test cell for efficiently testing the accuracy of communication signals between a standard cell and an application cell

An integrated circuit (1) for monitoring communication signals transmitted between a standard cell and an application cell, said integrated circuit comprising:

• a test cell (3), coupled between said standard cell (4) and said application cell (2) via communication links, designed to perform one of the functions of storing information supplied by said communication signals and testing said communication signals passing between said standard cell and said application cell based upon modification data supplied to said integrated circuit,
• said application cell comprising a program memory which supplies instructions, via an instruction bus, to said standard cell in response to an instruction address carried by an instruction address bus,
• said standard cell executing said instructions provided by said program memory, wherein conductors of said instruction bus and said instruction address bus are carried by said communication links, and
• wherein said standard cell comprises branching means for replacing at least one erroneous instruction from said program memory with a replacement instruction previously stored in said integrated circuit in response to an error condition detected by said test cell on at least one of said communication links.