Design and Device Mismatch Analysis of CSS–UWB Pulse Generator

This paper presents the design of a Chirp Spread Spectrum (CSS), ultra-wideband (UWB), pulse generator (PG) and device mismatch impact on its performance. The proposed CSS-PG is built using a differential ring oscillator (RO) controlled by a ramp generator, allowing varying linearly the pulse frequency with time over the CSS pulse duration. Device mismatches and random variations during integrated circuit manufacturing are the most critical imperfections in high precision differential UWB voltage controlled RO circuit. These mismatches lead to behavioral variations of the PG. The proposed CSS-UWB-PG is designed and analyzed using CMOS 0.18[Formula: see text][Formula: see text]m technology. The CSS-PG presents an output swing of 266[Formula: see text]mV Vpp for 20[Formula: see text]nsec and consumes 1.72[Formula: see text]mW for a PRF of 10[Formula: see text]MHz. The simulated PSD covers the UWB low band from 3[Formula: see text]GHz to 5[Formula: see text]GHz and complies with the FCC regulations. For [Formula: see text] mismatch, the simulation results show a maximum relative accuracy on oscillation frequency and phase noise of 3.43% and 6.9%, respectively. Monte Carlo and process simulation are performed to study the impact of the random parameter variation on this CSS-PG. Theses simulations show the robustness of the proposed design as the PG PSD is still inside the FCC-UWB mask and its bandwidth is greater than 500[Formula: see text]MHz.

An Opamp-Less PVT Compensation Structure for Ramp Generator Circuit

Accurate ramp signal, with low power dissipation, is highly demanded, for applications like counter ADC. This paper presents a novel low power ramp generator circuit with a negative feedback loop for compensation of the variations in process, voltage, and temperature (PVT). While using an opamp for PVT compensation has been essential in the previous ramp generator structures, the proposed ramp generator is opamp-less. Derived equations of the proposed ramp generator circuit show that PVT compensation structure works effectively. In addition, the circuit design and simulations were done in TSMC 0.18[Formula: see text][Formula: see text]m CMOS technology. Corner analysis shows that integral non-linearity (INL) of the ramp signal is about 3.7[Formula: see text]mV, for a wide temperature range, while the power dissipation of the circuit is about 1.16[Formula: see text][Formula: see text]W.

A Low-Power Column-Parallel Gain-Adaptive Single-Slope ADC for CMOS Image Sensors

A low-power column-parallel gain-adaptive single-slope analog-to-digital converter (ADC) for CMOS image sensors is proposed. The gain-adaptive function is realized with the proposed switched-capacitor based gain control structure in which only minor changes from the traditional single-slope ADC are required. A switched-capacitor controlled dynamic bias comparator and a flip-reduced up/down double-data-rate (DDR) counter are proposed to reduce the power consumption of the column circuits. A 12-bit current steering digital-to-analog converter (DAC) with a two-dimensional gradient error tolerant switching scheme is adopted in the ramp generator to improve the linearity of the ADC. The proposed techniques were experimentally verified in a prototype chip fabricated in the TSMC 180 nm CMOS process. A single-column ADC consumes a total power of 63.2 μ W and occupies an area of 4.48 μ m × 310 μ m. The measured differential nonlinearity (DNL) and integral nonlinearity (INL) of the ADC are −0.43/+0.46 least significant bit (LSB) and −0.84/+1.95 LSB. A 13-bit linear output is acquired in nonlinearity within 0.08% of the full scale after calibration.

A Highly Linear CMOS Image Sensor Design Based on an Adaptive Nonlinear Ramp Generator and Fully Differential Pipeline Sampling Quantization with a Double Auto-Zeroing Technique

For a complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor image sensor with highly linear, low noise and high frame rate, the nonlinear correction and frame rate improvement techniques are becoming very important. The in-pixel source follower transistor and the integration capacitor on the floating diffusion node cause linearity degradation. In order to address this problem, this paper proposes an adaptive nonlinear ramp generator circuit based on dummy pixels used in single-slope analog-to-digital converter topology for a complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) image sensor. In the proposed approach, the traditional linear ramp generator circuit is replaced with the new proposed adaptive nonlinear ramp generator circuit that can mitigate the nonlinearity of the pixel unit circuit, especially the gain nonlinearity of the source follower transistor and the integration capacitor nonlinearity of the floating diffusion node. Moreover, in order to enhance the frame rate and address the issue of high column fixed pattern noise, a new readout scheme of fully differential pipeline sampling quantization with a double auto-zeroing technique is proposed. Compared with the conventional readout structure without a fully differential pipeline sampling quantization technique and double auto-zeroing technique, the proposed readout scheme cannot only enhance the frame rate but can also improve the consistency of the offset and delay information of different column comparators and significantly reduce the column fixed pattern noise. The proposed techniques are simulated and verified with a prototype chip fabricated using typical 180 nm CMOS process technology. The obtained measurement results demonstrate that the overall nonlinearity of the CMOS image sensor is reduced from 1.03% to 0.047%, the efficiency of the comparator is improved from 85.3% to 100%, and the column fixed pattern noise is reduced from 0.43% to 0.019%.