A random time-to-digital converter

Abstract

The invention discloses a stochastic time-digital converter, which comprises an input switching circuit, a stochastic time-digital converter (STDC) array and an encoder. A clock circuit inputs two clock signals into the two input ends of the input switching circuit respectively. The input switching circuit transmits the two clock signals input by the clock signal to the two input ends of the STDC array in form of alternate transposition, and simultaneously outputs a triggering control signal to the encoder. Each comparator in the STDC array independently judges the speed of each clock signal, and transmits a judgment result to the encoder for summarization. The encoder outputs the magnitude and plug-minus of a phase difference between the two clock signals. The number of equivalent comparators in the STDC array is multiplied by utilizing the stochastic characteristics of the STDC to maximally eliminate device mismatching and the influence of a process, power voltage and temperature on the circuit; and compared with the conventional STDC circuit, the STDC has the characteristics of hardware saving, low power consumption and small area.

Description

technical field [0001] The invention relates to a random time-to-digital converter with an input switching circuit, which can identify the time difference between the rising edges of two clock signals and express it in digital form. Background technique [0002] TDC (Time-Digital Converter, Time-Digital Converter) is widely used in integrated circuits, and is mainly used to provide phase discrimination for digital phase-locked loops. In addition, many applications such as nuclear medicine imaging, laser range detection, and particle half-life detection in high-energy physics rely on TDC to identify small time (phase) differences. The TDC is implemented with an all-digital process, and has the advantage of good portability as the process size gradually shrinks. In addition, the all-digital TDC circuit has better noise immunity characteristics and lower power consumption. Because TDC quantizes the time (phase) difference into digital output, compared with the traditional fr...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

However, since the achievable resolution is directly related to the number of comparators used, the improvement of resolution requires more comparators, and the power consumption, area and hardware consumption will inevitably increase.

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