Near-threshold-voltage circuit design: The design challenges and chances

NTV is a new low power design concept for the pursuit of the highest power usage efficiency. The characteristics for each logic family are quite different under NTV while comparing to its operation under normal supply voltage. The circuit/architecture design policy under NTV is also different from its normal supply voltage operation. Process variation, performance degradation, and noise-interference are the three major design challenges in NTV design. In this paper, some effective candidate design solutions are presented to overcome these crucial NTV issues.