Design of a Low Power Delta Sigma Modulator for Analog to Digital Conversion

The growing demand of “System on a Chip” applications necessitates integration of multiple devices on the same chip. Analog to Digital conversion is essential to interfacing digital systems to external devices such as sensors. This presents a difficulty since high precision analog devices do not mix well with high speed digital circuits. The digital environment constraints put demand on the analog portion to be resource efficient and noise tolerant at the same time. Even more demanding, Analog to Digital converters must consume a small amount of power since “System on a Chip” circuits often target portable applications. Analog to digital conversion based on Delta Sigma modulation offers an optimal solution to the above problems. It is based on digital signal processing theory and offers benefits such as small footprint, high precision, noise de-sensitivity, and low power consumption. This thesis presents a methodology for designing low power Delta Sigma modulators using a combination of modern circuit design techniques. The developed techniques have resulted in several modulators that satisfy the initial design parameters. We applied this method to design three different modulators in the 0.35um digital CMOS technology with a 3.3V supply voltage. A first order Self-Referenced modulator has a resolution of 8 bits and the lowest power consumption at 75 uW. The most successful design is the second order Self Referenced modulator that produces 12 bits of resolution with a power consumption of 87 uW. A second order Floating Gate modulator possesses features for high noise rejection, and produces 10 bits of resolution while consuming 276 uW. It is concluded that self-referenced modulators dissipate less power and offer higher performance as compared more complicated circuits such as the floating gate modulator.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Science

Level thesis:degree_level

masters

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Electrical and Computer Engineering

Department dc:contributor.department

Electrical and Computer Engineering

Grantor dc:publisher

Virginia Tech

Year dc:date.issued

2003

Author dc:creator

• Itskovich, Mikhail

Chair dc:contributor.committeechair

• Ha, Dong Sam

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Tront, Joseph G.
• Reed, Jeffrey H.

• modulator
• low power
• delta sigma
• ADC

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Dc Identifier Other

etd-09032003-094041

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/34901