The MIPI C-PHY Standard: A Generalized Multiconductor Signaling Scheme

Abstract

Synchronous digital communication buses have traditionally relied on two fundamental principles related to signal modulation and maximum likelihood sampling. In simple terms, transmitting information digitally starts with representing the information using data bits and then encoding these bits into some physical quantity, such as a voltage potential or an electronic current flow. Such a physical quantity is transported over a physical medium, such as a metallic conductor or even free space [1]. Similarly, when it comes to receiving data bits, a receiver is expected to quantize the sensed physical quantity and minimize the probability of quantization error in the presence of noise, fading, and interference [2].