Estimating the power dissipation range in switched-capacitor circuits

This paper examines some issues involved in the estimation of the power dissipation in switched-capacitor circuits. It is shown on examples that, in general, the power dissipation depends upon the order in which the switches connected to the same clock phase are closed. As this order cannot be predicted with certainty, it is problematic to try to estimate the power dissipated by a switched-capacitor circuit in terms of a single number. A more realistic estimate of the power dissipation is to give a range of possible values. It is shown that upper and lower bounds on the power dissipation can be computed by solving a single-source shortest path problem on a directed graph. Numerical results reveal that in some cases the switching order can have a dramatic effect on the circuit´s power dissipation