부산대학교 도서관

Temperature monitoring and regulation is a critical power/performance feature in microprocessors. Due to the multiplicity of hotspots, a large number of on-die sensors are utilized. This requires them to be highly compact, low energy and fast. A miniaturized current controlled oscillator (CCO) sensor is described for this application. It has an area of only 700 $\mu \text{m}^{2}$ in the 16-nm FinFET process, with an energy consumption of 0.25 nJ in a 6.9- $\mu \text{s}$ conversion. The inaccuracy is within ±1.5 °C peak-to-peak (p-p) over a 130 °C range, at a resolution of 0.32 °C. These characteristics make the circuit attractive for high-density thermal sensing.