Characteristics of a variable length ring oscillator and its use in PLL based systems

Abstract

This paper describes the properties of a multiplexer based variable length ring oscillator and the effects of using it as a voltage controlled oscillator (VCO) in a phase locked loop (PLL) based system. The application of the proposed VCO in a PLL used as an FM demodulator or as a frequency synthesizer has been examined and it has been shown that the length control facility of the VCO could be used for improving the performances of those systems. Hardware experimental results confirm the predictions regarding the performance enhancement.