On-Chip Detector for Single-Event Noise Sensing with Voltage Scaling Function

Mohamed ABBAS
Makoto IKEDA
Kunihiro ASADA

Publication
IEICE TRANSACTIONS on Electronics   Vol.E89-C    No.3    pp.370-376
Publication Date: 2006/03/01
Online ISSN: 1745-1353
DOI: 10.1093/ietele/e89-c.3.370
Print ISSN: 0916-8516
Type of Manuscript: Special Section PAPER (Special Section on VLSI Design Technology in the Sub-100 nm Era)
Category: Signal Integrity and Variability
Keyword: 
on-chip detector,  non-periodic noise,  high-swing noise,  

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Summary: 
In this paper we present an on-chip noise detection circuit. In contrast with the previous works concerning on-chip noise measurement, this detector does not assume specific noise properties such as periodicity. The detector is able to continuously capture 10 nano-second time window from the measured signal with a resolution equal to 100 pico-second. The requested bandwidth of the output channel can be adjusted freely, therefore, the user can avoid the effect of on-chip parasites and the need to off-chip sophisticated monitoring tools. The detector is equipped with an on-chip programmable voltage divider, which enables measuring the high and low swing fluctuations accurately. Therefore, the detector is suitable to measure the non-periodic/single event noise for the purpose of reliability evaluation and performance modeling. The detector is implemented in a test chip using Hitachi 0.18 µm technology.