Semiconductor Timing Sensor for Dynamic Voltage and Clock Adjustment
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Solution Overview
Problem
Semiconductor circuits face performance variations due to temperature and fabrication process differences across wafers and chips, leading to inefficiencies in power management and battery life in IoT devices, as existing methods like ring-oscillator and critical paths replica sensors are inadequate in covering design-specific parameters and incur area overhead and power consumption.
Innovation Solution
A sensor circuit system that dynamically adjusts clock rates and supply voltages by identifying sensitive paths to design and environmental parameters, using a power management unit, sensor, and device under test to ensure timely performance, reducing the number of paths required and minimizing power consumption.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If ring-oscillator or critical paths replica sensors are used to measure performance variations, then performance compensation is achieved, but area overhead and power consumption increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts only the essential timing-critical paths from the full circuit design to create the sensor model. By identifying and isolating the most sensitive paths that dominate timing behavior, the sensor achieves accurate performance measurement without replicating the entire circuit, thereby reducing area overhead and power consumption while maintaining compensation effectiveness.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent segments the circuit into distinct timing paths with different sensitivity characteristics. By dividing the circuit into critical and non-critical paths, and only modeling the critical ones in the sensor, the approach achieves accurate timing measurement with reduced complexity, lower area overhead, and decreased power consumption compared to full-circuit replication.
2Reliability
If ring-oscillator or critical paths replica sensors are used to measure performance variations, then performance compensation is achieved, but area overhead increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts only the essential timing-critical paths from the full circuit design to create the sensor model. By identifying and isolating the most sensitive paths that dominate timing behavior, the sensor achieves accurate performance measurement without replicating the entire circuit, thereby reducing area overhead and power consumption while maintaining compensation effectiveness.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent segments the circuit into distinct timing paths with different sensitivity characteristics. By dividing the circuit into critical and non-critical paths, and only modeling the critical ones in the sensor, the approach achieves accurate timing measurement with reduced complexity, lower area overhead, and decreased power consumption compared to full-circuit replication.
3Measurement precision
If existing sensor methods are used, then some performance variations are detected, but design-specific parameters are not adequately covered
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a dynamic sensor configuration that can adapt to different circuit designs by automatically identifying and modeling the specific critical paths relevant to each design. This dynamic adaptation allows the sensor to accurately capture design-specific timing characteristics while maintaining measurement precision, overcoming the limitation of fixed sensor architectures.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies local quality by tailoring the sensor model to match the specific timing characteristics of each circuit design. By identifying and modeling only the locally critical paths that are most sensitive to process, voltage, and temperature variations for that particular design, the sensor achieves both high measurement precision and full coverage of design-specific parameters.
Data Source
AI summary
Disclosed are techniques that can be used in a semiconductor chip to determine performance such as timing performance. Among other features, supply voltages and clock rates may be adjusted to accommodate the operating temperature and to compensate for the processing variations that occurred when that chip was produced, or may occur as the chip is used. The techniques include determining a series of variables that affect performance, determining the sensitivity of timing paths in the circuit to each variable, duplicating the most sensitive paths. A novel sensor circuit is produced that includes the sensitive paths, which can be used to determine when the chip is performing as required and when it is not, and adjusting one or more supply voltages and/or clock rates in a static or real time manner when the circuit is not performing as required.