Design and fabrication of a capacitance switch array usable on a DTCXO

This work is based on a pre-industrial evaluation of a Capacitance Switch Array (CSA). The main idea of this study is the replacement in a DTCXO of the usual compensation system composed of a Digital to Analog Converter coupled with a varactor, in order to decrease the total power consumption and the supply voltage. First, fundamentals of the CSA concept are exposed, followed by the conception methodology. Then, the technology that has been used is exposed and the characteristics of the final product are presented. The final CSA is a twelve bits device fully integrated in a twenty pins dual in line package with a dynamic range of variation of one hundred pF. Finally, simulated forecast characteristics of a DTCXO using the CSA are presented