Miscellaneous active electrical nonlinear devices – circuits – and – Specific identifiable device – circuit – or system – With specific source of supply or bias voltage
Reexamination Certificate
2005-04-05
2005-04-05
Cunningham, Terry D. (Department: 2816)
Miscellaneous active electrical nonlinear devices, circuits, and
Specific identifiable device, circuit, or system
With specific source of supply or bias voltage
C327S512000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06876250
ABSTRACT:
A combined low-voltage, low-power band-gap reference and temperature sensor circuit is provided for providing a band-gap reference parameter and for sensing the temperature of a chip, such as an eDRAM memory unit or CPU chip, using the band-gap reference parameter. The combined sensor circuit is insensitive to supply voltage and a variation in the chip temperature. The power consumption of both circuits, i.e., the band-gap reference and the temperature sensor circuits, encompassing the combined sensor circuit is less than one μW. The combined sensor circuit can be used to monitor local or global chip temperature. The result can be used to (1) regulate DRAM array refresh cycle time, e.g., the higher the temperature, the shorter the refresh cycle time, (2) to activate an on-chip or off-chip cooling or heating device to regulate the chip temperature, (3) to adjust internally generated voltage level, and (4) to adjust the CPU (or microprocessor) clock rate, i.e., frequency, so that the chip will not overheat. The combined band-gap reference and temperature sensor circuit of the present invention can be implemented within battery-operated devices having at least one memory unit. The low-power circuits of the sensor circuit extend battery lifetime and data retention time of the cells of the at least one memory unit.
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Houghton Russell J.
Hsu Louis L.
Joshi Rajiv V.
Cunningham Terry D.
International Business Machines - Corporation
Percello Louis J.
Tra Quan
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