Design and examination of a multiple-valued flip-flop circuit with stair shaped I-V curved device as a coupling element

A stair-type multiple-valued flip-flop (MVFF) in which a device with the stair-shaped I-V curve is used for coupling the inverter is described. A pair of the quantizing inverters whose input and output are cross-coupled has many stable states. The MVFF designs are verified by actual circuits in which the coupling circuits consist of constant-current diodes and Zener diodes. A compact device with the stair-shaped I-V curve is obtained by inserting a stair-shaped gap between gate and drain in an ordinary MOSFET. Using this device as the coupling element for the inverter, the quantized MVFF circuit is examined