A high-PSR transient-enhanced output-capacitorless CMOS low-dropout regulator for SoC applications

A transient-enhanced output-capacitorless CMOS low-dropout voltage regulator (LDO) with high power supply rejection (PSR) is introduced for system-on-chip applications. In order to reduce external pin count and device area and be amenable to full integration, the large external capacitor used in the classical LDO design is eliminated and replaced with a much smaller 5.7?pF on-chip capacitor. High-gain folded-cascode stage, wideband common source stage, voltage subtractor stage and transient-enhanced circuit are designed altogether to realise circuit compensation and achieve good frequency and transient performances. A current-sensing and transient-enhanced circuit is utilised to reduce transient voltage dips effectively and efficiently drive different kinds of load capacitances. The active chip area of the proposed regulator is only 200?×?280?µm². The simulation results under mixed-signal 0.18?µm 1P6M process show that this novel LDO's output voltage can recover within 1.7?µs (rising) and 2.41?µs (falling) under full load-current changes. The input voltage is ranged from 2 to 5?V for a load current 50?mA and an output voltage of 1.8?V. This novel LDO has wide unity-gain frequency stability and is stable for estimated equivalent parasitic capacitive loads from 0 to 100?pF. Moreover, it can achieve a PSR of ?78.5 and ?73?dB at 1 and 10?kHz, respectively.     

一种CMOS单片LDO线性稳压器的设计

提出了一种单片集成的高电源抑制比LDO线性稳压器,主要应用于PLL中VCO和电荷泵的电源供给.该稳压器采用RC补偿方案,与其他补偿方法相比,RC补偿几乎不消耗额外电流.误差放大器采用折叠共源共栅结构,可以提供较高的电源抑制比,并且使得设计的LDO为两级放大器结构,有利于简化补偿网络.所设计的LDO在低频时电源抑制比(PSR)为一69 dB,在lMHz处的电源抑制比为-19 dB.采用0.35 μm工艺流片,测试结果表明,该LDO可以为负载提供70 mA的电流.     

A wide-bandwidth PSR-enhanced low-dropout regulator using a bandpass feedforward supply ripple rejection circuit

A low-dropout regulator with a wide-bandwidth feedforward supply noise cancellation path for enhancing supply noise rejection at middle-to-high frequency is presented in this paper. This idea has been realized by a bandpass filter and a signal-nulling technique with the help of a voltage buffer. For the PSR filter design, the total on-chip capacitance is about 18.75 pF. This circuit has been implemented in a 0.35 µm CMOS process and occupies an active chip area of 0.062 mm². From the experimental results, the proposed LDO can operate with nominal dropout voltage of 200 mV at maximum load of 25 mA and quiescent current of 26 μA. It achieves a power-supply rejection better than ?59 dB up to 10 MHz with a 4 μF output capacitor.     

Full on-chip and area-efficient CMOS LDO with zero to maximum load stability using adaptive frequency compensation

A full on-chip and area-efficient low-dropout linear regulator (LDO) is presented. By using the proposed adaptive frequency compensation (AFC) technique, full on-chip integration is achieved without compromising the LDO's stability in the full output current range. Meanwhile, the use of a compact pass transistor (the compact pass transistor serves as the gain fast roll-off output stage in the AFC technique) has enabled the LDO to be very area-efficient. The proposed LDO is implemented in standard 0.35 μm CMOS technology and occupies an active area as small as 220×320 μm~2, which is a reduction to 58% compared to state-of-the-art designs using technologies with the same feature size. Measurement results show that the LDO can deliver 0-60 mA output current with 54 μA quiescent current consumption and the regulated output voltage is 1.8 V with an input voltage range from 2 to 3.3 V.     

一种用于LDO稳压器的共享预稳压电路

提出了一种用于LDO稳压器的共享预稳压电路.该共享预稳压电路中包含一个电源抑制减法电路以提高基准源的电源抑制,应用电流负反馈结构以降低基准源的温度系数和电源抑制随工艺阈值电压变化的敏感度,还可以降低LDO稳压器的输出噪声.仿真结果表明在阈值电压发生士20％变化的情况下,基准源的温度系数变化只有0.11×10-6/℃,电...     

A frequency compensation scheme for LDO voltage regulators

A stable low dropout (LDO) voltage regulator topology for low equivalent series resistance (ESR) capacitive loads is presented. The proposed scheme generates a zero internally instead of relying on the zero generated by the load capacitor and its ESR combination for stability. It is demonstrated that this scheme realizes robust frequency compensation, facilitates the use of multilayer ceramic capacitors for the load of LDO regulators, and improves transient response and noise performance. Test results from a prototype fabricated in AMI 0.5-/spl mu/m CMOS technology provide the most important parameters of the regulator viz., ground current, load regulation, line regulation, output noise, and start-up time.     

A fast-transient high-PSR output-capacitor-free low-dropout regulator for low-power embedded systems

A low-power fast-transient output-capacitor-free low-dropout regulator (LDO) with high power-supply rejection (PSR) is presented in this paper. The proposed LDO utilizes a non-symmetrical class-AB amplifier as the input stage to improve the transient performances. Meanwhile, PSR enhancement circuit, which only consumes 0.2-µA quiescent current at light load, is utilized to form a feedforward cancellation path for improving PSR over wide frequency range. The LDO has been designed and simulated in a mixed signal 0.13-µm CMOS process. From the post simulation results, the LDO is capable of delivering 100-mA output current at 0.2-V dropout voltage, with 3.8-µA quiescent current at light load. The undershoot, the overshoot and the 1 % settling time of the proposed LDO with load current switching from 50 µA to 100 mA in 300 ns are about 100 mV, 100 mV and 1 µs, respectively. With the help of proposed PSR enhancement technique, the LDO achieves a PSR of ?69 dB at 100 kHz frequency for a 100-mA load current.     

PSR enhancement techniques for output-capacitor-free LDO regulator design

In this paper, power-supply rejection (PSR) enhancement techniques for a output-capacitor-free low drop-out (LDO) regulator with an NMOS pass transistor are presented. For DC PSR and bandwidth enhancement, DC PSR compensation and capacitor cancelation circuits were developed on the basis of precisely derived PSR models of the conventional LDO regulator. The effectiveness of the PSR enhancement techniques were verified using analytic PSR models, SPICE simulation, and measurements. The fabricated LDO regulator using 0.18 \(\upmu\)m CMOS technology maintains PSR less than \(-74\,\hbox {dB}\) up to 10 MHz, while delivering the output current and voltage of 25 mA and 1.2 V, respectively.     

A fully on-chip 1-μW capacitor-free low-dropout regulator with adaptive output stage

A fully on-chip 1-μW fast-transient response capacitor-free low-dropout regulator (LDO) using adaptive output stage (AOS) is presented in this paper in standard 0.13-μm CMOS process. The AOS circuit is proposed to deliver extra four times of output current of the operational amplifier at medium to heavy load to extend the bandwidth of the LDO and enhance the slew rate at the gate of the power transistor. And the AOS circuit is shut off at light load to reduce the quiescent current and maintain the stability without requiring area-consuming on-chip capacitor. Meanwhile, the proposed AOS circuit introduces V_OUT offset at medium to heavy load to counteract the V_OUT drop, which is caused by I_LOAD increase. Hence, transient performances of LDO and V_OUT drop between light load and full load are improved significantly with 1.1-μA quiescent current at light load. From the post simulation results, the LDO regulates the output voltage at 0.7 V from a 0.9-V supply voltage with a 100-mA maximum load current. The undershoot, the overshoot and the recovery time of the proposed LDO with I_LOAD switching from 50 μA to 100 mA in 1 μs are about 130 mV, 130 mV and 1.5 μs, respectively. And the V_OUT drop between light load and full load reduces to 0.16 mV.     

一种衬底波纹注入的宽频带高PSR无片外电容LDO

基于40 nm CMOS工艺,设计了一种具有高频高电源抑制(PSR)的无片外电容 低压差线性稳压器(LDO)电路。电路采用1.1 V电源供电,LDO输出电压稳定在0.9 V。仿真结果表明,传统无片外电容LDO电路的PSR将会在环路的单位增益 频率(UGF)处上升到一个尖峰,之后才经输出节点处的电容到地的通路开始降低,最高时PSR甚至大于0 dB。采用新型的衬底波纹注入技术的LDO能很好地抑制PSR的尖峰,可以做到全频段都在-20 dB以上,相比传统结构,尖峰处的PSR提高了20 dB以上。该LDO适用于需要低电压供电的射频电路。     

Design of an LDO with capacitor multiplier

This paper presents a low quiescent current,highly stable low-drop out(LDO) regulator.In order to reduce capacitor value and control frequency response peak,capacitor multipliers are adopted in the compensation circuit with mathematic calculations.The phase margin is adequate when the load current is 0.1 or 150 mA.Fabricated in an XFAB 0.6μm CMOS process,the LDO produces 12.2 mV(0.7%) overshoot voltage while the current changes at 770 mA/100μs with a capacitor load of 10μF.     

A fully on-chip area-efficient CMOS low-dropout regulator with fast load regulation

Fully integrated voltage regulators with fast transient response and small area overhead are in high demand for on-chip power management in modern SoCs. A fully on-chip low-dropout regulator (LDO) comprised of multiple feedback loops to tackle fast load transients is proposed, designed and simulated in 90?nm CMOS technology. The LDO also adopts an active frequency compensation scheme that only needs a small amount of compensation capacitors to ensure stability. Simulation results show that, by the synergy of those loops, the LDO improves load regulation accuracy to 3???V/mA with a 1.2?V input and 1?V output. For a 100?mA load current step with the rise/fall time of 100?ps, the LDO achieves maximum output voltage drop and overshoot of less than 95?mV when loaded by a 600?pF decoupling capacitor and consumes an average bias current of 408???A. The LDO also features a magnitude notch in both its PSRR and output impedance that provides better suppression upon the spectral components of the supply ripple and the load variation around the notch frequency. Monte Carlo simulations are performed to show that the LDO is robust to process and temperature variations as well as device mismatches. The total area of the LDO excluding the decoupling capacitor is about 0.005?mm². Performance comparisons with existing solutions indicate significant improvements the proposed LDO achieves.     

Full On-Chip CMOS Low-Dropout Voltage Regulator

This paper proposes a solution to the present bulky external capacitor low-dropout (LDO) voltage regulators with an external capacitorless LDO architecture. The large external capacitor used in typical LDOs is removed allowing for greater power system integration for system-on-chip (SoC) applications. A compensation scheme is presented that provides both a fast transient response and full range alternating current (AC) stability from 0- to 50-mA load current even if the output load is as high as 100 pF. The 2.8-V capacitorless LDO voltage regulator with a power supply of 3 V was fabricated in a commercial 0.35-mum CMOS technology, consuming only 65 muA of ground current with a dropout voltage of 200 mV. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed capacitorless LDO architecture overcomes the typical load transient and ac stability issues encountered in previous architectures.     

具有快速瞬态响应和低静态电流的CMOS低漏失稳压器设计

 设计了一种具有快速瞬态响应能力的低漏失稳压器,利用提出的一种瞬态响应加速(Transient Response Enhancement,TRE)电路,有效地提高了稳压器的瞬态响应速度,而且瞬态响应速度的提高并不增加静态电流.设计的LDO电路采用0.5μm标准CMOS工艺投片验证,芯片面积为0.49mm².该LDO空载下的静态电流仅23μA,最大带载200mA.在1μF输出电容、200mA/100ns负载阶跃变化时的最大瞬态输出电压变化量小于3.5％.     

一种动态补偿、高稳定性的LDO设计

设计并实现了一种动态补偿、高稳定性的LDO.针对LDO控制环路稳定性随负载电流变化的特点,给出一种新颖的动态补偿电路.这种补偿电路能很好地跟踪负载电流的变化,从而使控制环路的稳定性几乎与负载电流无关.设计采用CSMC 0.5μm标准CMOS工艺,利用Cadence的EDA工具完成电路设计、版图绘制和流片测试,最终芯片面...     

High slew rate current mode transconductance error amplifier for low quiescent current output-capacitorless CMOS LDO regulator

This paper presents a CMOS low quiescent current output-capacitorless low-dropout regulator (LDO) based on a high slew rate current mode transconductance amplifier (CTA) as error amplifier. Using local common-mode feedback (LCMFB) in the proposed CTA, the order of transfer characteristic of the circuit is increased. Therefore, the slew rate at the gate of pass transistor is enhanced. This improves the LDO load transient characteristic even at low quiescent current. The proposed LDO topology has been designed and post simulated in HSPICE in a 0.18 µm CMOS process to supply the load current between 0 and 100 mA. The dropout voltage of the LDO is set to 200 mV for 1.2–2 V input voltage. Post-layout simulation results reveal that the proposed LDO is stable without any internal compensation strategy and with on-chip output capacitor or lumped parasitic capacitances at the output node between 10 and 100 pF. The total quiescent current of the LDO including the current consumed by the reference buffer circuit is only 3.7 µA. A final benchmark comparison considering all relevant performance metrics is presented.     

A capacitor-free CMOS low-dropout regulator with damping-factor-control frequency compensation

A 1.5-V 100-mA capacitor-free CMOS low-dropout regulator (LDO) for system-on-chip applications to reduce board space and external pins is presented. By utilizing damping-factor-control frequency compensation on the advanced LDO structure, the proposed LDO provides high stability, as well as fast line and load transient responses, even in capacitor-free operation. The proposed LDO has been implemented in a commercial 0.6-/spl mu/m CMOS technology, and the active chip area is 568 /spl mu/m/spl times/541 /spl mu/m. The total error of the output voltage due to line and load variations is less than /spl plusmn/0.25%, and the temperature coefficient is 38 ppm//spl deg/C. Moreover, the output voltage can recover within 2 /spl mu/s for full load-current changes. The power-supply rejection ratio at 1 MHz is -30 dB, and the output noise spectral densities at 100 Hz and 100 kHz are 1.8 and 0.38 /spl mu/V//spl radic/Hz, respectively.     

CMOS low dropout linear regulator with single Miller capacitor

A 2-5V 150 mA CMOS low dropout (LDO) linear regulator with a single Miller capacitor of 4pF is presented. The proposed LDO regulator with a bandgap voltage reference has been fabricated in a 0.35 /spl mu/m CMOS process and the active chip area is 485/spl times/586 /spl mu/m. The maximum output current is 150 mA and the regulated output voltage is 1.8 V.     

An ultra-low power output capacitor-less low-dropout regulator with slew-rate-enhanced circuit

An ultra-low power output-capacitorless low-dropout (LDO) regulator with a slew-rate-enhanced (SRE)circuit is introduced.The increased slew rate is achieved by sensing the transient output voltage of the LDO and then charging (or discharging) the gate capacitor quickly.In addition,a buffer with ultra-low output impedance is presented to improve line and load regulations.This design is fabricated by SMIC 0.18 μm CMOS technology.Experimental results show that,the proposed LDO regulator only consumes an ultra-low quiescent current of 1.2 μA.The output current range is from 10 μA to 200 mA and the corresponding variation of output voltage is less than 40 mV.Moreover,the measured line regulation and load regulation are 15.38 mV/V and 0.4 mV/mA respectively.     

250 mV Supply Voltage Digital Low‐Dropout Regulator Using Fast Current Tracking Scheme

This paper proposes a 250 mV supply voltage digital low‐dropout (LDO) regulator. The proposed LDO regulator reduces the supply voltage to 250 mV by implementing with all digital circuits in a 0.11 μm CMOS process. The fast current tracking scheme achieves the fast settling time of the output voltage by eliminating the ringing problem. The over‐voltage and under‐voltage detection circuits decrease the overshoot and undershoot voltages by changing the switch array current rapidly. The switch bias circuit reduces the size of the current switch array to 1/3, which applies a forward body bias voltage at low supply voltage. The fabricated LDO regulator worked at 0.25 V to 1.2 V supply voltage. It achieved 250 mV supply voltage and 220 mV output voltage with 99.5% current efficiency and 8 mV ripple voltage at 20 μA to 200 μA load current.