Title :
Full-swing Schottky BiCMOS/BiNMOS and the effects of operating frequency and supply voltage scaling
Author :
Bellaouar, A. ; Abu-Khater, I.S. ; Elmasry, M.I. ; Chikima, A.
Author_Institution :
VLSI Res. Group, Waterloo Univ., Ont., Canada
fDate :
6/1/1994 12:00:00 AM
Abstract :
Novel full-swing BiCMOS/BiNMOS logic circuits which use Schottky diode in the pull-up section for low supply-voltage regime are developed. The full-swing pull-up operation is performed by saturating the bipolar transistor with a base current pulse. After which, the base is isolated and bootstrapped to a voltage higher than VDD. The BiCMOS/BiNMOS circuits do not require a PNP bipolar transistor. They outperform other BiCMOS circuits at low supply voltage, particularly at 2 V using 0.5 μm BiCMOS technology. Delay, area, and power dissipation comparisons have been performed. The new circuits offer delay reduction at 2 V supply voltage of 37% to 56% over CMOS. The minimum fanout at which the new circuits outperform CMOS gate is 2 to 3. Furthermore, the effect of the operating frequency on the delay of a wide range of BiCMOS and BiNMOS circuits is reported for the first time, showing the superiority of the Schottky circuits
Keywords :
BiCMOS integrated circuits; CMOS integrated circuits; Schottky-barrier diodes; VLSI; integrated logic circuits; 0.5 μm BiCMOS technology; 0.5 mum; 2 V; 2 V supply voltage; BiCMOS/BiNMOS logic circuits; CMOS gate; Schottky circuits; Schottky diode; base current pulse; bipolar transistor; bootstrapped; delay reduction; full-swing Schottky BiCMOS/BiNMOS; low supply voltage; low supply-voltage regime; minimum fanout; operating frequency; power dissipation comparisons; pull-up section; saturating; supply voltage scaling; BiCMOS integrated circuits; Bipolar transistors; CMOS technology; Delay; Frequency; Isolation technology; Logic circuits; Low voltage; Power dissipation; Schottky diodes;
Journal_Title :
Solid-State Circuits, IEEE Journal of
