Context-dependent transformation of Pareto-optimal performance fronts of operational amplifiers

The use of Pareto-optimal performance fronts in emerging design methodologies for analog integrated circuits is a keystone to overcome the limitations of traditional design methodologies. However, most techniques to generate the fronts reported so far neglect the effect that the surrounding circuitr...

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Detalhes bibliográficos
Autores: Roca Moreno, Elisenda, Velasco Jiménez, Manuel, Castro López, Rafael, Fernández Fernández, Francisco Vidal
Tipo de documento: artigo
Estado:Versión aceptada para publicación
Data de publicação:2012
País:España
Recursos:Universidad de Sevilla (US)
Repositório:idUS. Depósito de Investigación de la Universidad de Sevilla
OAI Identifier:oai:idus.us.es:11441/78479
Acesso em linha:https://hdl.handle.net/11441/78479
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10470-011-9785-4
Access Level:Acceso aberto
Palavra-chave:Analog integrated circuits
Design automation
Circuit sizing
Simulation-based optimization
Multi-objective optimization
Descrição
Resumo:The use of Pareto-optimal performance fronts in emerging design methodologies for analog integrated circuits is a keystone to overcome the limitations of traditional design methodologies. However, most techniques to generate the fronts reported so far neglect the effect that the surrounding circuitry (such as the load impedance) has on the Pareto-front, thereby making it only realistic for the context where the front was generated. This strongly limits the use of the Pareto front because of the strong dependence between the key performances of an analog circuit and its surrounding circuitry, but, more importantly, because this circuitry remains unknown until the Pareto-optimal front is being used. Since performance front generation is a costly process, this paper proposes that performance fronts for a new context of use of a given circuit can be obtained from fronts that were previously generated under some different conditions. Towards this goal, a transformation methodology for performance objectives of operational amplifiers has been developed. Experimental results for a folded-cascode and a Miller-compensated operational amplifiers show that this is a promising approach to reuse the fronts in multiple contexts.