Arbitrary Design of High Order Noise Transfer Function for A Novel Class of Reduced-Sample-Rate Sigma-Delta-Pipeline ADCs

A novel noise transfer function (NTF) for high order reduced-sample-rate sigma-delta-pipeline (SDP) ADCs is presented. The proposed NTF determines the location of the non-zero poles improving the stabilization of the loop and implementing the reduced-sample-rate structure, concurrently. A design methodology based on simulated-annealing-algorithm is developed to design the optimum NTF. To verify the usefulness of the proposed NTF and design procedure, two different modulators are presented. Simulation results show that with a 4th order modulator, designed making use of the proposed approach, the maximum SNDR of 115dB and 124.1dB can be achieved with only OSR of 8, and 16 respectively.