PLACEMENT AND ROUTING OF CELLS USING CELL-LEVEL LAYOUT-DEPENDENT STRESS EFFECTS
Granted: June 11, 2020
Application Number:
20200184136
Disclosed is technology for placing cells in a circuit design layout to thereby improve the operation of place-and route equipment used for fabrication of an integrated circuit. The target cells are chosen from a cell library which includes descriptions for a plurality of cells, and information about dependency of each cell on hypothetical boundary conditions that can be imposed on the cell by any stress source originating in the vicinity of said cell in the layout. In order to select a…
Deconvolution by Convolutions
Granted: April 9, 2020
Application Number:
20200110986
Disclosed herein are apparatus, method, and computer-readable storage device embodiments for implementing deconvolution via a set of convolutions. An embodiment includes a convolution processor that includes hardware implementing logic to perform at least one algorithm comprising a convolution algorithm. The at least one convolution processor may be further configured to perform operations including performing a first convolution and outputting a first deconvolution segment as a result…
Area Efficient and High-Performance Wordline Segmented Architecture
Granted: April 2, 2020
Application Number:
20200105309
A memory array including a plurality of memory cells and a plurality of drivers is disclosed. The plurality of memory cells may be arranged in a plurality of rows and a plurality of columns. Memory cells corresponding to a row of the plurality of rows may be logically grouped into a plurality of memory array segments. The plurality of drivers may be coupled to corresponding first ends of corresponding memory array segments of the plurality of memory array segments. Second ends of the…
Mapping Intermediate Material Properties to Target Properties to Screen Materials
Granted: March 19, 2020
Application Number:
20200089841
A system for evaluating candidate materials for fabrication of integrated circuits includes a data processor coupled to a memory. Roughly described, the data processor is configured to: calculate and write to a first database, for each of a plurality of candidate materials, values for each property in a set of intermediate properties; calculate and write to a second database, values for a selected target property for various combinations of values for the intermediate properties and…
Elmore Delay Time (EDT)-Based Resistance Model
Granted: March 19, 2020
Application Number:
20200089830
We disclose an integrated circuit design tool for modeling resistance of a terminal of a transistor such as a gate, a source, a drain, and a via. A structure of the terminal is specified in a data structure in memory using a three-dimensional (3D) coordinate system. For each of a plurality of volume elements in the specified structure, an Elmore delay time (EDT) is determined. For those volume elements in the plurality of volume elements that are located on a surface of the gate terminal…
Adaptive Parallelization For Multi-scale Simulation
Granted: March 19, 2020
Application Number:
20200089543
Roughly described, a task control system for managing multi-scale simulations receives a case/task list which identifies cases to be evaluated, at least one task for each of the cases, and dependencies among the tasks. A module allocates available processor cores to at least some of the tasks, constrained by the dependencies, and initiates execution of the tasks on allocated cores. A module, in response to completion of a particular one of the tasks, determines whether or not the result…
REFLECTIVE EUV MASK ABSORBER MANIPULATION TO IMPROVE WAFER CONTRAST
Granted: March 19, 2020
Application Number:
20200089101
Techniques and systems for improving wafer contrast by manipulating reflective extreme ultraviolet (EUV) mask absorber are described. Some embodiment disclosed herein provide for EUV absorber material, which transmits some EUV illumination, to suppress the printing of sub-resolution assist features (SRAFs) while making the SRAFs closer in size to the printed feature by thinning the SRAF absorber thickness from the nominal mask absorber thickness in the bright-field mask case. In the…
SCALABLE BOOLEAN METHODS IN A MODERN SYNTHESIS FLOW
Granted: March 5, 2020
Application Number:
20200074019
Techniques and systems for optimizing a logic network are described. Some embodiments automatically identify scenarios where Boolean methods are best driven by truth tables, binary decision diagrams (BDDs) or satisfiability (SAT). Some embodiments use circuit partitioning techniques that are based on hash-tables and topological sorting, and that are capable of grouping nodes with high simplification likelihood and still are able to efficiently scale to large circuits. Some embodiments…
TEST CASE SELECTION AND ORDERING WITH COVERT MINIMUM SET COVER FOR FUNCTIONAL QUALIFICATION
Granted: February 27, 2020
Application Number:
20200065234
Techniques and systems for test case selection and ordering with covert minimum set cover for functional qualification are described. Some embodiments can determine a first set of test cases by, iteratively, identifying a set of faults that is covered by a smallest set of test cases, determining whether or not a test case that covers a fault is able to detect the fault, and selecting and adding a test case to the first set of test cases. Next, the embodiments can execute a minimum set…
CAPTURING ROUTING INTENT BY USING A MULTI-LEVEL ROUTE PATTERN DESCRIPTION LANGUAGE
Granted: January 30, 2020
Application Number:
20200034509
Techniques and systems for capturing and using routing intent in an integrated circuit (IC) design are described. Some embodiments use a graphical user interface (GUI) to capture routing intent for a net, wherein the routing intent includes a set of circuit objects associated with the net, a routing pattern, and optionally a set of user-provided attribute values. Next, the embodiments provide the routing intent to a router, wherein the router uses the routing intent to route the net.
PROVIDING GUIDANCE TO AN EQUIVALENCE CHECKER WHEN A DESIGN CONTAINS RETIMED REGISTERS
Granted: January 23, 2020
Application Number:
20200026813
Systems and techniques are described for providing guidance to an equivalence checker when a design contains retimed registers. Some embodiments can perform at least a register retiming optimization on a first design to obtain a second design. Next, the embodiments can determine one or more codes to provide guidance for connecting the set/clear inputs of the retimed registers. The first design, the second design, and the one or more codes can then be provided to an equivalence checker,…
PESSIMISM IN STATIC TIMING ANALYSIS
Granted: January 23, 2020
Application Number:
20200026812
The disclosure relates to a method, computer program product or data processing system for performing graph-based static timing analysis, GBA, of an integrated circuit design having a set of timing paths. The method comprises identifying a subset of the set of timing paths and performing path-based analysis, PBA, of the subset of timing paths to determine at least one PBA timing parameter for each timing path of the subset of timing paths. The method further comprises determining at…
AUTOMATED COVERAGE CONVERGENCE BY CORRELATING RANDOM VARIABLES WITH COVERAGE VARIABLES SAMPLED FROM SIMULATION RESULT DATA
Granted: January 16, 2020
Application Number:
20200019664
A data analysis engine is implemented in a testbench to improve coverage convergence during simulation of a device-under-validation (DUV). During a first simulation phase initial stimulus data is generated according to initial random variables based on user-provided constraint parameters. The data analysis engine then uses a time-based technique to match coverage variables sampled from simulation response data with corresponding initial random variables, determines a functional…
SUBSTRATES AND TRANSISTORS WITH 2D MATERIAL CHANNELS ON 3D GEOMETRIES
Granted: January 2, 2020
Application Number:
20200006578
Roughly described, a transistor is formed with a semiconductor 2D material layer wrapped conformally on at least part of a 3D structure. The 3D structure can be for example a ridge made of a dielectric material, or made of dielectric material alternating longitudinally with a semiconductive or conductive material. Alternatively the 3D structure can be tree-shaped. Other shapes are possible as well. Aspects also include methods for making such structures, as well as integrated circuit…
Estimation of Effective Channel Length for FinFets and Nano-Wires
Granted: January 2, 2020
Application Number:
20200004922
Roughly described, a system for estimating an effective channel length of a 3D transistor having a gate length below 20 nm involves estimating an effective volume of the channel and a cross-sectional area of the channel, and estimating the effective channel length as the ratio of effective volume to cross-sectional area. Preferably the effective volume is estimated as the sum of the Voronoi volumes within containing boundaries of the channel, excluding those volumes having a dopant…
SPEED CONVERTER FOR FPGA-BASED UFS PROTOTYPES
Granted: December 12, 2019
Application Number:
20190377846
A method for generating FPGA-based prototype systems capable of implementing UFS HS-G4 communication protocols using inexpensive/slow FPGAs. ASIC/SoC-targeted circuit designs are modified to include a speed converter that causes a UFS controller to generate transmitted data streams at one-half operating speed (e.g., 146 MHz) during HS-G4 operations, modifies the transmitted data streams to intersperse filler data values between transmitted data values, and transmits the modified data…
First Principles Design Automation Tool
Granted: November 28, 2019
Application Number:
20190362042
An electronic design automation tool includes an application program interface API which includes a set of parameters and procedures supporting atomistic scale modeling of electronic materials. The procedures include a procedure to execute first principles calculations, a procedure to process results from the first principles calculations to extract device scale parameters from the results, a procedure to determine whether the extracted device scale parameters lie within a specified…
Enhancing Memory Yield and Performance Through Utilizing Nanowire Self-Heating
Granted: November 21, 2019
Application Number:
20190355437
A method for improving an integrated circuit design which has transistors with nanowire channels comprises identifying a particular device having a particular transistor with a nanowire channel; and adding to the integrated circuit design circuitry which, when activated, repairs the particular transistor by self-heating. The method can comprise determining a memory cell that has a read current below a passing criteria, the memory cell having a transistor with a nanowire channel on a…
CRYSTAL ORIENTATION ENGINEERING TO ACHIEVE CONSISTENT NANOWIRE SHAPES
Granted: November 14, 2019
Application Number:
20190348541
The independent claims of this patent signify a concise description of embodiments. Disclosed is technology, roughly described, in which a semiconductor structure includes a substrate supporting a column of at least one (and preferably more than one) horizontally-oriented nanosheet transistor, each having a respective channel segment of semiconductor crystalline nanosheet material (preferably silicon or a silicon alloy) sheathed by gate stack material, wherein the channel segments have a…
Logic Timing and Reliability Repair for Nanowire Circuits
Granted: October 31, 2019
Application Number:
20190333600
A method for improving an integrated circuit design having transistors with nanowire channels comprises identifying a particular device having a particular transistor with a nanowire channel; and adding to the integrated circuit design a controller which, when activated, repairs the particular transistor by self-heating. A critical path in logic circuitry in the design can be determined including a particular device having a transistor with a nanowire channel. A repair circuit can be…
