Semiconductor integrated circuit and communication device for logic input-state control during and following power-up
Granted: October 7, 2003
Patent Number:
6630845
The present invention provides a semiconductor integrated circuit device and a communication device incorporating same. Two MOS (strong and weak) devices are connected to each control input of a transceiver. Both MOS devices are turned on while the supply voltage is ramping from 0V. The strong device remains on for a period of 10-20 microseconds. The strong MOS device pulls the input to a disabled state against external capacitance which is attempting to pull the input to an enabled…
Microrelays and microrelay fabrication and operating methods
Granted: September 16, 2003
Patent Number:
6621135
Microrelays and microrelay fabrication and operating methods providing a microrelay actuator positively controllable between a switch closed position and a switch open position. The microrelays are a five terminal device, two terminals forming the switch contacts, one terminal controlling the actuating voltage on an actuator conductive area, one terminal controlling the actuating voltage on a first fixed conductive area, and one terminal controlling the actuating voltage on a second…
Globally planarized backend compatible thin film resistor contact/interconnect process
Granted: August 19, 2003
Patent Number:
6607962
A method of forming a thin film resistor contact incorporates an etch-stop material to protect the underlying thin film resistor from a subsequent dry etching process to form a contact opening to the thin film resistor. More specifically, the method includes forming a thin film resistor, forming a first dielectric layer over the thin film resistor, forming a first opening through the first dielectric layer to expose an underlying portion of the thin film resistor, forming an etch-stop…
Method of forming an integrated inductor and high speed interconnect in a planarized process with shallow trench isolation
Granted: July 15, 2003
Patent Number:
6593200
A method of forming a semiconductor device with an inductor and/or high speed interconnect. The method comprises forming an epitaxial layer over the substrate, forming an opening through the epitaxial layer to expose an underlying region of the substrate, forming a first dielectric material within the opening of the epitaxial layer, planarizing the first dielectric layer, forming a second dielectric material layer over the first dielectric material layer, and then forming a metallized…
Bipolar transistor and methods of forming bipolar transistors
Granted: July 15, 2003
Patent Number:
6593640
A bipolar transistor comprises a base region and an an extrinsic base region being located generally adjacent to the base region. The extrinsic base region has implanted therein a dopant and a dopant diffusion-retarding substance. The dopant diffusion-retarding substance serves to reduce the diffusion of the dopant into the base region. Preferably, the dopant and diffusion-retarding substances are implanted such that there is a buffer zone in the extrinsic base region immediately…
High voltage integrated Miller capacitor feedback circuit
Granted: July 8, 2003
Patent Number:
6590439
A circuit for controlling an electronic semiconductor switching device to limit the in-rush current when an expansion board is plugged into an electronic system. An integrated thin-film capacitor is used in a high-voltage feedback circuit by attenuating the output voltage, which can be substantially greater than the breakdown voltage of the capacitor, with an integrated voltage divider. An adequate slew rate is obtained using a low capacitance by providing a high-impedance internal…
Circuit with source follower output stage and adaptive current mirror bias
Granted: July 1, 2003
Patent Number:
6586987
A source follower output stage achieves low output impedance and high power supply rejection while operating at low output voltage and low supply voltage. This circuit has improved performance due to the source follower transistor, the sense transistor, and the output mirror, these items forming a common source difference amplifier. This common source difference amplifier adjusts the common voltage of the signal mirror to equalize the signal mirror input and output voltage. Thus, the…
Method and apparatus for protecting radio frequency power amplifiers
Granted: June 17, 2003
Patent Number:
6580318
A power amplifier protection system to sense one or more operating conditions of a power amplifier and regulate the power of the input signal to the power amplifier as a response to one or more of the sensed operating conditions. This dynamic protection system may protect a power amplifier from failure by monitoring such operating conditions as power output and temperature and reducing the amplitude of the input signal if the power amplifier is operating beyond specified levels.
Dual interleaved DC to DC switching circuits realized in an integrated circuit
Granted: June 10, 2003
Patent Number:
RE38140
Dual interleaved DC to DC switching circuits realizable in an integrated circuit form, capable of monitoring individual inductor current using only one current sense resistor and providing automatic duty cycle adjustment to keep the inductor currents in the interleaved DC to DC switching circuits balanced. The preferred embodiment includes a gain error amplifier, an integral error amplifier, and a differentiator error amplifier and circuits for controlling the nominal duty cycle, with…
Proportional to absolute temperature references with reduced input sensitivity
Granted: May 27, 2003
Patent Number:
6570438
Proportional to absolute temperature references having reduced input sensitivity. The references utilize four bipolar transistors, at least one of which is of a different size, coupled to a resistor in a loop, whereby the difference in the VBEs of the transistors appears as a voltage across the resistor. The addition of a further resistor of a selected size in the base circuit of one of the four transistors provides an input variation of an opposite sign to that caused by the finite base…
Two wire mixed signal bi-directional bus interface
Granted: May 20, 2003
Patent Number:
6567878
A bus interface is provided including a first bus transmission medium adapted for being connected to a control signal source which generates a plurality of sequential control signals. During use, the first bus transmission medium serves to communicate the sequential control signals. Associated with the first bus transmission medium is a second bus transmission medium that is in communication with at least one peripheral device. Such device generates an output signal on the second bus…
Curvature-corrected band-gap voltage reference circuit
Granted: May 13, 2003
Patent Number:
6563370
This band-gap circuit overcomes the deficiencies of conventional band-gap circuits by compensating for higher order temperature effects, thereby increasing accuracy. A first resistor network including two resistors is connect to a first transistor while a second resistor network that includes one resistor is connected to a second transistor. One resistor in the first resistor network has a high temperature sensitivity, and therefore produces a temperature dependent ratio of currents…
GM-controlled current-isolated indirect-feedback instrumentation amplifier
Granted: May 6, 2003
Patent Number:
6559720
Constant GM models and GM-controlled current-isolated indirect-feedback instrumentation amplifiers. The constant GM models provide a transconductance that is proportional to the inverse of a resistance in the constant GM model circuits over a wide range of common mode and differential mode inputs. Current-isolated indirect-feedback instrumentation amplifiers using constant GM models to track the common mode and differential inputs of, and provide the tail currents for, the differential…
M-level diode junction temperature measurement method cancelling series and parallel parasitic influences
Granted: April 29, 2003
Patent Number:
6554470
The present invention provides an improved method and apparatus to measure p-n junction device temperature by testing a device with M-Levels of applied collector current, sensing changes in output characteristics, and calculating the device current offset error and leakage current error due to parasitic parallel resistance where the leakage current error due to parasitic parallel resistance may be treated and eliminated as current offset error. Application of M levels of excitation…
Low cost, high performance flexible tester handler docking interface
Granted: April 15, 2003
Patent Number:
6547571
The present invention is related to a method and apparatus of securing and testing an IC or similar device, in which the connection of the IC is achieved through the use of a handler PCB and dual “Outrigger” PCBs connected to a test head via “flex joints”. More specifically, the present invention discloses a method and apparatus to flexibly dock a handler PCB containing a device under test to a test head through the use of dual Outrigger PCBs capable of flexible…
Efficient high overdrive transimpedance amplifiers
Granted: April 8, 2003
Patent Number:
6545544
Transimpedance amplifiers that provide moderate bandwidth and very large overdrive current capabilities while consuming a minimum amount of power supply current. Existing transimpedance amplifier topologies use a quiescent current somewhat larger than the overdrive current that must be tolerated while the present invention reduces the value of the quiescent current and can tolerate bi-directional overdrive current several times larger than the current consumption of the circuit itself.…
Current source methods and apparatus for light emitting diodes
Granted: March 25, 2003
Patent Number:
6538394
Current source methods and apparatus for light emitting diodes providing constant diode current and illumination in the presence of voltage and process variations. The method comprises providing a predetermined current through a first transistor, and mirroring the current through the first transistor to at least one additional transistor while holding the voltage across the first transistor to a predetermined value, wherein each additional transistor is coupled in series with a light…
Low voltage, high impedance current mirrors
Granted: March 25, 2003
Patent Number:
6538496
Low voltage, high impedance current mirrors realizable in MOS or junction transistor circuits and particularly suited for use in integrated circuits. The current mirrors use first and second transistors coupled as a differential pair with a tail current that may be part of the input current to be mirrored. Another component of the input current to be mirrored is applied to the drain/collector of the first transistor of the differential pair, with the gate/base of that transistor being…
DC offset correction for direct conversion tuner IC
Granted: February 4, 2003
Patent Number:
6516187
The present invention discloses a method and apparatus for correcting the DC offset caused by self-conversion of the oscillator signal in an RF-to-baseband converter. The circuit comprises: a subtractor for subtracting an amplified DC offset signal from a filtered mixer signal to generate a corrected signal; a baseband amplifier coupled to the subtractor to receive the corrected signal to generate a baseband output signal; a low-pass filter coupled to the baseband amplifier to generate a…
Charge pump mode transition control
Granted: January 28, 2003
Patent Number:
6512411
A mode transitioning system (10) for a charge pump (12), which may optionally be embodied in an integrated circuit (28). A number of switches (30a-i) are operated based on an input detection sub-circuit (32) and an output detection sub-circuit (34) to controllably connect a number of flying capacitors (24, 26) in a variety of manners producing alternate input voltage to output voltage step ratios. One example embodiment of the mode transitioning system (10) proceeds from an idle state…
