Speaker: eric
When: 1:00PM Thursday 7th April 2005
Venue: 50-S201 (Hawken Bldg)
Abstract:
Analogue and mixed-signal designs are rapidly becoming significant in System-On-Chip (SoC) designs as digital computational cores need to interface with the real world. Cellular phones, magnetic disk drives, speech recognition hardware and other 'digital' innovations in fact rely on a core of analogue circuitry. Mature digital CAD tools competently handle the digital portions of SoC designs. This is not true for analogue components, still designed manually using time-consuming techniques. Analogue circuits may consume 90% of the design time, yet consuming only 10% of the chip area. During my industrial experience with Nano Silicon, a provider in analogue and mixed-signals solutions, these deficiencies in the typical design process were easily observed.
Thus we propose the MIX-SYN Framework, a platform for fast-tracking analogue and mixed-signals exploration and design for the industry. It is implemented in MATLAB/Simulink and consists of three major components: MIX-SYN Design Blocks, MIX-SYN Design Library, and Seamless SPICE. The Design Blocks' hierarchical templates allow rapid prototyping of analogue and mixed-signals circuits. These are easily accessible from the Design Library and simulated in a circuit simulator using Seamless-SPICE. This flexibility is aimed at streamlining the analogue and mixed-signals design process.
In this seminar, I will first present a critical survey of current design methodologies and tools. Then I will describe the MIX-SYN Framework and its potential in the analogue and mixed-signal design industry. Finally the project tasks, its implementation, and plan will be discussed.
Contact: Dr Adam Postula