A time-based approach for multi-GHz embedded mixed-signal characterization and measurement /

The increasingly more sophisticated systems that are nowadays implemented on a single chip are placing stringent requirements on the test industry. New test strategies, equipment, and methodologies need to be developed to sustain the constant increase in demand for consumer and communication electronics. Techniques for built-in-self-test (BIST) and design-for-test (DFT) strategies have been proven to offer more feasible and economical testing solutions.Previous works have been conducted to perform on-chip testing, characterization, and measurement of signals and components. The current thesis advances those techniques on many levels. In terms of performance, an increase of more than an order of magnitude in speed is achieved. 70-GHz (effective sampling) on-chip oscilloscope is reported, compared to 4-GHz and 10-GHz ones in previous state-of-the-art implementations. Power dissipation is another area where the proposed work offer a superior solution compared to previous alternatives. All the proposed circuits do not exceed a few milliWatts of power dissipation, while performing multi-GHz high-speed signal capture at a medium resolution. Finally, and possibly most importantly, all the proposed circuits for test rely on a different form of signal processing; the time-based approach. It is believed that this approach paves the path to a lot of new techniques and circuit design skills that can be investigated more deeply. As an integral part of the time-based processing approach for GHz signal capture, this thesis verifies the advantages of using time amplification. The use of such amplification in the time domain is materialized with experimental results from three specific integrated circuits achieving different tasks in GHz high-speed in-situ signal measurement and characterization. Advantages of using such time-based approach techniques, when combined with the use of a front-end time amplifier, include noise immunity, the use of synthesizable digital cells, and circuit building blocks that track the technology scaling in terms of area and speed

Design and Performance Evaluation of a Time Domain Microwave Imaging System

We design a time domain microwave system dedicated to medical imaging. The measurement accuracy of the system, that is, signal-to-noise ratio, due to voltage noise and timing noise, is evaluated. Particularly, the effect of coupling media on the measurement accuracy is investigated both numerically and experimentally. The results suggest that the use of suitable coupling media betters the measurement accuracy in the frequency range of interest. A signal-to-noise ratio higher than 30 dB is achievable in the range of 500 MHz to 3 GHz when the effective sampling rate is 50 Gsa/s. It is also indicated that the effect of the timing jitter on the strongest received signal is comparable to that of the voltage noise

Characterisation of on-chip electrostatic discharge waveforms with sub-nanosecond resolution: design of a differential high voltage probe with high bandwidth

Bliksem werd tot aan de ontdekking van de bliksemafleider (18e eeuw) gezien als een van de gevaarlijkste bedreigingen voor het stadsleven. Door het gebruik van micro-elektronica werden ingenieurs gewaar dat ditzelfde fysische verschijnsel, elektrostatische ontlading of ESD genoemd, zich ook op microscopische schaal voordoet. In de jaren zeventig was meer dan 30% van al het chipfalen te wijten aan ESD. Om dit tegen te gaan werd met het onderzoek naar ESD-protecties en -meetsystemen aangevangen. Om meer informatie over het gedrag van een ESD-protectie te verkrijgen wordt een ESD-puls op dit systeem losgelaten. Het antwoord van de protectie op deze puls wordt dan bepaald m.b.v. spannings- en stroomgolfvormmetingen. In dit werk wordt een nieuwe nauwkeurige ESD-golfvormmeettechniek voorgesteld die directe metingen op protecties kan uitvoeren. De karakterisering van ESD-golfvormen op chip wordt enorm bemoeilijkt door de grote hoeveelheid elektromagnetische interferentie die de ESD-puls veroorzaakt. Dit wordt omzeild door het gewenste signaal naar een veilige omgeving te transporteren, waar een standaard meettoestel de meting kan uitvoeren. Dit transport wordt gerealiseerd m.b.v. optische communicatie, wat immuun is voor elektromagnetische interferentie. Zo kan nauwkeurige in-situ-informatie worden verkregen waarmee de ESD-protecties in de toekomst verbeterd kunnen worden.Up to the 18th century, lightning was considered one of nature’s most dangerous threats in city life. This all ended with the lightning rod, protecting thousands of homes during lightning storms. The large-scale use of microelectronics has made engineers aware of the same physical phenomenon occuring on a microscopic scale. This phenomenon is called electrostatic discharge or ESD. In the seventies, more than 30% of all chip failure was attributed to static electricity. To counter this effect, the research for on-chip ESD protections was born. Today ESD is a buzzing line of research, as with new and faster chip technologies comes a higher ESD vulnerability. This makes ESD protection and measurement increasingly important. Although ESD is now a major subject in chip design, it copes with a lack of accurate device models. To gain more information on the exact operation of an ESD protection, an ESD pulse is unleashed upon this device. The response of the protection on this pulse is then assessed by performing voltage or current waveform measurements. This work presents a waveform measurement technique able to accurately perform direct measurements on the ESD protection. Due to the high amount of electromagnetic interference caused by the ESD pulse, direct waveform characterisation near the protection is hard. This is solved by transporting the target signal into a clean area, where the measurement is performed by standard lab equipment. The key is that this transportation is realized by means of optical communication, which is immune to electromagnetic interference. This way, accurate in situ information can be used to protect tomorrow’s chips

Design and Performance of the ARIANNA Hexagonal Radio Array Systems

We report on the development, installation and operation of the first three of seven stations deployed at the ARIANNA site's pilot Hexagonal Radio Array in Antarctica. The primary goal of the ARIANNA project is to observe ultra-high energy (>100 PeV) cosmogenic neutrino signatures using a large array of autonomous stations each dispersed 1 km apart on the surface of the Ross Ice Shelf. Sensing radio emissions of 100 MHz to 1 GHz, each station in the array contains RF antennas, amplifiers, 1.92 G-sample/s, 850 MHz bandwidth signal acquisition circuitry, pattern-matching trigger capabilities, an embedded CPU, 32 GB of solid-state data storage, and long-distance wireless and satellite communications. Power is provided by the sun and LiFePO4 storage batteries, and the stations consume an average of 7W of power. Operation on solar power has resulted in >=58% per calendar-year live-time. The station's pattern-trigger capabilities reduce the trigger rates to a few milli-Hertz with 4-sigma thresholds while retaining good stability and high efficiency for neutrino signals. The timing resolution of the station has been found to be 0.049 ps, RMS, and the angular precision of event reconstructions of signals bounced off of the sea-ice interface of the Ross Ice Shelf ranged from 0.14 to 0.17 degrees. A new fully-synchronous 2+ G-sample/s, 1.5 GHz bandwidth 4-channel signal acquisition chip with deeper memory and flexible >600 MHz, <1 mV RMS sensitivity triggering has been designed and incorporated into a single-board data acquisition and control system that uses an average of only 1.7W of power. Along with updated amplifiers, these new systems are expected to be deployed during the 2014-2015 Austral summer to complete the Hexagonal Radio Array.Comment: 17 Page, 27 Figures, 1 Tabl

Real-Time Blind Photonic Interference Cancellation for mmWave MIMO

Multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) mmWave devices broadcast multiple spatially-separated data streams simultaneously in order to increase data transfer rates. Data transfer can, however, be compromised by interference. Conventional techniques for mitigating interference require additional space and power not generally available in handheld mobile devices. Here, we propose a photonic mmWave MIMO receiver architecture capable of interference cancellation with greatly reduced space and power needs. We demonstrate real-time photonic interference cancellation with an integrated FPGA-photonic system that executes a novel zero-calibration micro-ring resonator control algorithm. The system achieves sub-second cancellation weight determination latency with sub-Nyquist sampling. We evaluate the impact of canceller design parameters on performance, establishing that effective photonic cancellation is possible in handheld devices with less than 30 ms weight determination latency

Development of a Waveform Sampling ASIC with Femtosecond Timing for a Low Occupancy Vertex Detector.

Ph.D. Thesis. University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa 2018

Reflections of a Wave: An Analysis of Photonic Doppler Velocimetry Systems

Munitions are one of the Air Force\u27s most effective weapons in eliminating targets, but also one of the most expensive. Due to the inherent high-cost in deploying munitions, munition shock wave detonation must be better observed and quantified for munitions to be more cost-efficient. PDV systems have the potential to achieve this quantification of shock wave properties on a molecular scale during solid-against-solid impacts. The overall goal of this research was to determine whether the current photonic Doppler velocimetry (PDV) system at Eglin Air Force Base is prepared for future explosive sensitivity testing. This determination was done through an uncertainty analysis of the PDV system\u27s results. The PDV system was given shock detonation velocities comparable to experimental explosive detonation velocities to investigate how well the system performed. This thesis concluded that the current PDV system employed by the Advanced Initiation Sciences team, (Munitions Directorate, AFRL) is capable of explosive sensitivity testing. The errors from the data results shows the current PDV system is within reasonable range to measure molecular shock wave interaction, with the highest noise fraction percentage at 5.1 percent

Agile low phase noise radio-frequency sine wave generator applied to experiments on ultracold atoms

We report on the frequency performance of a low cost (~500$) radio-frequency sine wave generator, using direct digital synthesis (DDS) and a field-programmable gate array (FPGA). The output frequency of the device may be changed dynamically to any arbitrary value ranging from DC to 10 MHz without any phase slip. Sampling effects are substantially reduced by a high sample rate, up to 1 MHz, and by a large memory length, more than 2.10^5 samples. By using a low noise external oscillator to clock the DDS, we demonstrate a phase noise as low as that of the master clock, that is at the level of -113 dB.rad^2/Hz at 1 Hz from the carrier for an output frequency of 3.75 MHz. The device is successfully used to confine an ultracold atomic cloud of rubidium 87 in a RF-based trap, and there is no extra heating from the RF source.Comment: 10 pages, 6 figure