Introduction to VLSI

Lecturer: Dr A. Hopper (ah@cl.cam.ac.uk)

No. of lectures: 12  

Semiconductor technology.

Semiconductors, junction, diode, transistor. Operation and structure of MOS transistor. Bipolar devices. Processing. Layout of inverter, design rules.

Combinatorial logic.

Stick diagrams, CMOS NAND, CMOS NOR, compound gates, transmission gate. Logic levels, noise margins, delay, power consumption, large loads, tracks. Pseudo-NMOS, dynamic CMOS, logic using switches and transmission gates. Optimisation for performance, scaling.

Storage elements and sequential machines.

Latch, flip-flop, static, dynamic. Clock generation and distribution. Phase-locked loops, metastability, self-timed systems.

Subsystems.

Gates, shifters, adders, counters, memory, PLAs.

Chip structure.

Gate arrays, standard cell, full custom. Floor planning, power, clock, pins.

CAD systems and algorithms.

Design flow. Circuit description, simulation, placement, routing, testing.

Chip examples.

Cambridge Fast Ring, ARM, Pentium, Power PC.

Recommended books:

Wolf, W. (1994). Modern VLSI Design - A System Approach. Prentice-Hall.

Weste, N.H.E. & Eshraghian, K. (1993). Principles of CMOS VLSI Design: A Systems Perspective. Addison-Wesley (2nd ed.).

Mead, C. & Conway, L. (1980). Introduction to VLSI. Addison-Wesley.