A fully digital, energy-efficient, adaptive power-supply regulator

Author

Wei, Gu-Yeon ; Horowitz, Mark

Author_Institution

Comput. Syst. Lab., Stanford Univ., CA, USA

Volume

34

Issue

4

fYear

1999

fDate

4/1/1999 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

520

Lastpage

528

Abstract

A voltage scaling technique for energy-efficient operation requires an adaptive power-supply regulator to significantly reduce dynamic power consumption in synchronous digital circuits. A digitally controlled power converter that dynamically tracks circuit performance with a ring oscillator and regulates the supply voltage to the minimum required to operate at a desired frequency is presented. This paper investigates the issues involved in designing a fully digital power converter and describes a design fabricated in a MOSIS 0.8-μm process. A variable-frequency digital controller design takes advantage of the power savings available through adaptive supply-voltage scaling and demonstrates converter efficiency greater than 90% over a dynamic range of regulated voltage levels

Keywords

DC-DC power convertors; adaptive control; power supply circuits; voltage regulators; 0.8 micron; MOSIS; adaptive power-supply regulator; converter efficiency; digitally controlled power converter; dynamic power consumption; dynamic range; energy-efficient operation; regulated voltage levels; ring oscillator; supply-voltage scaling; synchronous digital circuits; variable-frequency digital controller; voltage scaling technique; Circuit optimization; Digital circuits; Digital control; Digital-to-frequency converters; Dynamic voltage scaling; Energy consumption; Energy efficiency; Regulators; Ring oscillators; Voltage control;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Solid-State Circuits, IEEE Journal of

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9200

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/4.753685

Filename

753685