Abstract
Compact integrated thermal sensors are utilized to measure hot / cold spots in CPU cores in multiple locations and are important for the power/performance of the chip. Bipolar junction transistors (BJT) are the industry standard for temperature sensing elements because of their predictable physics. This paper reports on one of the smallest PNP BJT bandgap based thermal sensors to date. Miniaturization was achieved by using switched capacitor circuits with very small capacitors as opposed to the standard resistor-based bandgaps. Digitally controlled trims enable either a higher resolution or a nearly linear response to temperature. This ultra-miniature 0.003 mm2, PNP thermal- based sensor is fabricated in TSMC 65nm. It achieves a measured total {pm 3sigma } error of ±1.35°C with a resolution of 65mK and a 4.1ms conversion time. The sensor is optimized for dense CPU thermal mapping.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 9082088 |
| Pages (from-to) | 2984-2992 |
| Number of pages | 9 |
| Journal | IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems I: Regular Papers |
| Volume | 67 |
| Issue number | 9 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Sep 2020 |
Bibliographical note
Publisher Copyright:© 2004-2012 IEEE.
Funding
Manuscript received September 29, 2019; revised December 25, 2019, February 25, 2020, and March 29, 2020; accepted April 8, 2020. Date of publication April 29, 2020; date of current version September 2, 2020. This work was supported by the Hiper Consortium of the Israel Innovation Authority. This article was recommended by Associate Editor Z. Tan. (Corresponding author: Joseph Shor.) The authors are with the Faculty of Engineering, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan 5290002, Israel (e-mail: [email protected]).
| Funders | Funder number |
|---|---|
| Hiper Consortium of the Israel Innovation Authority |
Keywords
- Thermal sensor
- hot-spot
- sensor interface
- thermal management