A 7-bit 3.8-GS/s 2-Way Time-Interleaved 4-bit/Cycle SAR ADC 16× Time-Domain Interpolation in 28-nm CMOS

Abstract

This article presents a high-speed time-domain (TD) 4-bit/cycle successive approximation register (SAR) analog-to-digital converter (ADC). After converting the voltage input to the time domain, the compact interpolation-based time-to-digital converter (TDC) resolves 4-bit in each SAR cycle with 16 <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\times$</tex-math> </inline-formula> linear TD interpolation. This scaling-friendly architecture reduces the number of capacitive digital-to-analog converters (CDACs) and voltage-to-time converters (VTCs) significantly, leading to low power, small area, low kickback noise, and small input loading. A cascade current-starved inverter based VTC is used in the second SAR conversion cycle, which improves voltage-to-time gain and ensures speed and linearity. Besides, to reduce the TD interpolation error and eliminate the short-circuit current, a novel phase interpolator is proposed. A two-way time-interleaved 7-bit 3.8-GS/s prototype ADC was fabricated in a 28-nm CMOS, occupying an active area of 0.01 mm <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\rm ^2$</tex-math> </inline-formula> . With a Nyquist input, the measured signal-to-noise and distortion ratio (SNDR) and spurious-free dynamic range (SFDR) are 39.9 and 50.8 dB, respectively. Consuming 7.5 mW at 1.0 V supply, the Walden figure of merit (FoM <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\rm _w$</tex-math> </inline-formula> ) is 24.4 fJ/conversion-step.