Design of a measurement and interface integrated circuit for characterization of switched current memory cells

• Published in: Proceedings Eleventh International Conference on VLSI Design pp. 240 - 243
• Main Authors: Pereira, A.M., Pimenta, T.C., Moreno, R.L., Charry R, E., Jorge, A.M.
• Format: Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Published: IEEE 1998
• Subjects: Circuit testing; Distortion measurement; Frequency measurement; Integrated circuit measurements; Libraries; Mirrors; Noise measurement; Semiconductor device measurement; Signal processing; System testing
• ISBN: 0818682248; 9780818682247
• ISSN: 1063-9667; 2380-6923
• DOI: 10.1109/ICVD.1998.646610

Dynamic current mirrors, or SI current cells, are widely used in analog signal processing circuits. They could be implemented using a standard cell methodology if an SI cell library is available. Aiming at the creation of that library, this work presents the design of the measuring system and the interface circuits (on a chip) necessary to test SI cells with precision of 450 ppm and operation frequency of 3 MHz. Measurements performed on the prototypes show that the harmonics components and the noise level are 70 dB smaller than the fundamental and the total harmonic distortion is 0.04%.