Voltage and temperature sensor for a serializer/deserializer communication application
AssigneeInphi Corporation
InventorsKarthik S. GOPALAKRISHNAN, Sadettin CIRIT
Life of this patent
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Abstract
The present invention relates generally to integrated circuits. More particularly, the present invention provides a circuit and method for sensing a voltage and/or temperature from an integrated circuit device such as a Serializer/Deserializer (SerDes) integrated circuit device. But it will be recognized that the technique can be used for monitoring other system on chip devices, such as micro-controllers, digital signal processors, microprocessors, networking devices, application specific integrated circuits, and other integrated circuit devices that may desire on-chip temperature and/or voltage sensing capability.
Claims14
A single integrated circuit device comprising:
- a substrate member comprising silicon bearing material;
- a transmitter module configured on the substrate member;
- a receiver module configured on the substrate member;
- a phase lock loop module configured on the substrate member;
- a digital logic core configured on the substrate member;
- a voltage and temperature sensing module configured on the substrate member, the voltage and temperature sensing module comprising:
- a clock device comprising a first clock signal and a second clock signal;
- a first delay core comprising a first delay core output, the first delay core being coupled to the first clock signal and receiving input of the first clock signal;
- a second delay core comprising a second delay core output, the second delay core being coupled to the second clock signal and receiving input of the second clock signal, and coupled to the first delay core, the second clock signal being 180 degrees out of phase of the first clock signal;
- a common load feedback circuit coupled to the first delay core and being coupled to the second delay core through a common mode voltage extractor coupled to the first delay core output and the second delay core output;
- a common mode generator circuit coupled to the common load feedback circuit, the common mode generator circuit being configured to operate in a voltage measurement mode or a temperature measurement mode;
- a load equalizer device coupled to the second delay core output and the common load voltage extractor;
- a comparator device coupled to the first delay core output and the common load voltage extractor, the comparator device configured to convert a first waveform from the common mode voltage extractor to a second waveform;
- a pulse width modulated signal generator coupled to an output of the of the comparator device to output a third waveform;
- and
- an input coupled to a reference generator;
- a multiplexer device coupled to the input of the sensing device;
- and
- a plurality of lines configured for transferring information, where the plurality of lines being numbered from 1 through N, where N is an integer greater than 2, each of the plurality of lines being connect to input of the sensing device through the multiplexer device.
A method for measuring a temperature reading using a sensing device within an integrated circuit device, the method comprising:
- transferring a current information from a remote sensing site within the integrated circuit device to a reference generator, the remote sensing site being provided on a spatial portion of one of a plurality of integrated circuit modules provided on the integrated circuit device;
- receiving the current information at the reference generator;
- generating a signal proportional to the current information using the reference generator;
- transferring the generated signal to a common mode feedback circuit, the common mode feedback circuit being coupled to a first delay core and a second delay core;
- using the generated signal at the common mode feedback circuit to adjust an average voltage of a periodic waveform, the average voltage being representative of the current information;
- and
- converting the periodic waveform at a comparator device to output a pulse-width modulated signal representative of the current information.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.