Device and Method for Generating a Temperature-Independent Reference Voltage
AssigneeTaiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, Ltd.
InventorsYi Chen LU, Bei-Shing Lien, Szu-Lin Liu
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Abstract
A voltage generator includes a temperature-dependent voltage generator and a reference voltage node. The temperature-dependent voltage generator generates a voltage that increases with temperature and includes a first transistor stack and a second transistor stack, each of which has a first source/drain terminal and a gate terminal connected to each other at a temperature-dependent voltage generator node. The reference voltage node is connected to the temperature-dependent voltage generator and provides a reference voltage substantially independent of temperature. A method for generating the temperature-independent reference voltage is also disclosed.
Claims20
A voltage generator comprising:
- a temperature-dependent voltage generator configured to receive a first current and a second current that is a mirror current of the first current, and to generate, based on the first and second currents, a voltage that increases with temperature;
- and
- a reference voltage node connected to a source/drain terminal of the temperature-dependent voltage generator and configured to provide a reference voltage substantially independent of temperature.
A semiconductor device comprising:
- a first temperature-dependent voltage generator configured to receive a first current and a second current that is a mirror current of the first current, and to generate, based on the first and second currents, a voltage that increases with temperature;
- and
- a second temperature-dependent voltage generator configured to generate a voltage that decreases with temperature and connected to a first source/drain terminal of the first temperature-dependent voltage generator.
A method for generating a temperature-independent reference voltage, the method comprising:
- receiving, by a first temperature-dependent voltage node, a first current and a second current that is a mirror current of the first current;
- generating, based on the first and second currents, a first gate-to-source voltage based on a gate-to-source voltage of a first transistor module and a gate-to-source voltage of a second transistor module at the first temperature-dependent voltage generator node;
- generating, by a third transistor module, a second gate-to-source voltage;
- and
- providing, at a reference voltage node, a temperature-independent reference voltage based on the first and second gate-to-source voltages.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.