A Delayed Interpolation Time-to-Digital Converter

Abstract

The application discloses a delay interpolation type time-to-digital-converter (TDC). A fine time measuring portion successively connects a plurality of delay units in an end-to-end fashion to from annular delay chain interpolation to clock signals; at clock signal triggering time, a counter and a trigger respectively record narrow pulse signal circulation times and circulation positions in an annular delay chain; and then, the times and circulation position information is stored in a register unit to obtain fine time measuring results. Compared with a traditional method in which an open-loop delay structure employs a plurality of delay units to cover a work clock cycle, the method in which the delay units are in connection in an end-to-end fashion to from an annular delay chain structure can realize fine time measurement only by requiring less delay units; in addition, the method does not need coding, greatly reduces a resource occupation amount and power dissipation, and meanwhile realizes zero dead time measurement.

Description

technical field [0001] The present application relates to the technical field of time interval measurement, and more specifically, to a time-to-digital converter of delay interpolation type. Background technique [0002] A time-to-digital converter (Time-to-Digital Converter, TDC) is a device that converts time intervals into digital outputs. As a key technology, TDC is not only widely used in high-energy physics experiments, space detection instruments, laser radar detection, satellite navigation, scientific metrology and other high-tech scientific research and national defense fields, but also widely used in daily life and production, such as medical PET imaging, Environmental quality testing, drug composition analysis, non-destructive testing, and industrial speed and density measurement, etc. [0003] The current time-to-digital converters mainly use "coarse" counting + "fine" time measurement TDC in the application of high-precision time measurement, and adopt the meth...

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Problems solved by technology

However, the current high-precision time-to-digital converters that use the delay chain interpolation method to achieve fine time measurement all use an open-loop delay structure. The open-loop delay structure uses multiple delay units to cover a working clock cycle. When the working clock cycle is long , more delay units are needed, and the delay units must be coded. Therefore, the open-loop delay structure occupies more resources, has a large dead time, and consumes high power

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