Apparatus and methods for leakage current reduction in integrated circuits

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9698780-B2
Application number	US-201615163510-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	May 24, 2016
Priority date	Sep 12, 2013
Publication date	Jul 4, 2017
Grant date	Jul 4, 2017

Abstract

This disclosure relates to leakage current reduction in integrated circuits (ICs). In one aspect, an IC can include a digital logic circuit and a polarization circuit. The digital logic circuit can have a plurality of inputs and can include a plurality of logic gates. The polarization circuit can receive a standby signal and a digital input signal comprising a plurality of bits. When the standby signal is deactivated, the polarization circuit can control the plurality of inputs of the digital logic circuit based on the digital input signal. However, when the standby signal is activated the polarization circuit can control the plurality of inputs of the digital logic circuit to a low power state associated with a smaller leakage current of the plurality of logic gates relative to at least one other state of the digital logic circuit.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of integrated circuit (IC) design, the method comprising:
designing the IC to include a first digital logic circuit having a plurality of inputs and including a plurality of digital logic gates;
determining leakage current data of the first digital logic circuit, wherein the leakage current data indicates a leakage current of the first digital logic circuit for each state of the plurality of inputs, wherein the leakage current data is determined at least in part by simulating the first digital logic circuit;
selecting a low power state of the first digital logic circuit based at least in part on the leakage current data, wherein the low power state is associated with a smaller leakage current of the plurality of logic gates relative to at least one other state of the first digital logic circuit; and
designing the IC to include a first polarization circuit to control the plurality of inputs of the first digital logic circuit, wherein the first polarization circuit is operable to control the first digital logic circuit to the low power state when the IC is in a standby mode.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
designing the IC to include a plurality of flip-flops, wherein designing the IC to include the first polarization circuit comprises implementing a first portion of the plurality of flip-flops using a first type of flip-flop and implementing a second portion of the plurality of flip-flops using a second type of flip-flop, wherein the first type of flip-flop outputs a logical “1” in the standby mode, and wherein the second type of flip-flop outputs a logical “0” in the standby mode.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
designing the IC to include a second digital logic circuit; and
omitting a second polarization circuit to control a plurality of the inputs of the second digital logic circuit when the second digital logic circuit controls an input of a sensitive circuit, wherein a change of a value of the input of the sensitive circuit disturbs a functionality of the IC.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
designing the IC to include a second digital logic circuit;
determining a leakage current overhead associated with including a second polarization circuit to control a plurality of inputs of the second digital logic circuit;
determining a leakage current savings associated with including the second polarization circuit to control the plurality of inputs of the second digital logic circuit; and
designing the IC to include the second polarization circuit when the leakage current overhead is less than the leakage current savings.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein determining leakage current data of the first digital logic circuit comprises simulating the first digital logic circuit using a circuit simulator.

6. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
designing the first polarization circuit of the IC to control the plurality of inputs of the first digital logic circuit based at least in part on a digital input signal when the IC is not in the standby mode.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein selecting the low power state of the first digital logic circuit comprises selecting a state of the first digital logic circuit having the smaller leakage current of the plurality of logic gates relative to all other states of the first digital logic circuit.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein including the first polarization circuit is based at least in part on comparing a leakage current overhead of the first polarization circuit and the leakage current of the first digital logic circuit.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein determining leakage current data of the first digital logic circuit is based at least in part on measuring a leakage current of each state of the plurality of inputs of the first digital logic circuit.

Assignees

• Micron Technology Inc

Inventors

• Laurent Christophe Vincent Antoine

Classifications

• G06F30/30

  Circuit design · CPC title

• G06F30/33

  Design verification, e.g. functional simulation or model checking · CPC title

• H03K19/0016 Primary

  by using a control or a clock signal, e.g. in order to apply power supply · CPC title

• H03K19/20

  characterised by logic function, e.g. AND, OR, NOR, NOT circuits (H03K19/003 - H03K19/01 take precedence) · CPC title

• G06F17/5022

  Physics · mapped topic