Patents Examined by Jean B. Jeanglaude
  • Patent number: 11356110
    Abstract: A voltage-to-time converter (VTC) for a time-domain analog-to-digital converter is disclosed, which provides a time-domain analog-to-digital converter (T-ADC) with low power consumption and high precision. By combining the advantages of current-starving technology, current mirror technology, and body biasing technology, compared with the traditional structure, the VTC and T-ADC achieve excellent performance, such as low power consumption, high linearity, wide input dynamic range, and strong anti-interference to PVT variations. Compared with the traditional voltage-to-time converter, the disclosed voltage-to-time converter has a wider input dynamic range and higher linearity. The input voltage is connected to transistors in the circuit as a body bias, resulting in a very small body current, and no apparent increase in power consumption. The design of a low-power voltage-to-time converter is realized.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 24, 2021
    Date of Patent: June 7, 2022
    Assignee: University of Electronic Science and Technology of China
    Inventors: Hua Fan, Xiaohu Qi, Qianqian Deng, Quanyuan Feng, Shaoqing Lu, Huaying Su, Guosong Wang
  • Patent number: 11356115
    Abstract: A device includes a phase detector circuit, a charge pump circuit, a sample and hold circuit, a comparator, and a controller. The phase detector circuit detects a clock skew between a reference signal and an input signal. The charge pump circuit translates the clock skew into a voltage. A sample and hold circuit samples the voltage, at a first time, and maintain the sampled voltage until a second time. The comparator (i) detects a loop gain associated with the input signal based on the sampled voltage and the voltage at the second time and (ii) outputs a loop gain signal for adjustment of the input signal. The controller is coupled to the phase detector, the comparator, and the sample and hold circuit. The controller generates a plurality of control signals for automatically controlling operation of the phase detector, the comparator, and the sample and hold circuit.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 4, 2020
    Date of Patent: June 7, 2022
    Assignee: Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited
    Inventors: Mao-Hsuan Chou, Ya-Tin Chang, Ruey-Bin Sheen, Chih-Hsien Chang
  • Patent number: 11353828
    Abstract: In an embodiment, a method includes: providing a gray-coded time reference to a time-to-digital converter (TDC); receiving an event from an event signal; latching the gray-coded time reference into a memory upon reception of the event signal; and updating a time-of-flight (ToF) histogram based on the latched gray-coded time reference.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 15, 2021
    Date of Patent: June 7, 2022
    Assignee: STMICROELECTRONICS (RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT) LIMITED
    Inventors: John Kevin Moore, Neale Dutton
  • Patent number: 11342998
    Abstract: In a system for converting digital data into a modulated optical signal, an electrically controllable device having M actuating electrodes provides and optical signal that is modulated in response to binary voltages applied to the actuating electrodes. A digital-to-digital converter provides a mapping of input data words to binary actuation vectors for M bits and supplies the binary actuation vectors as M bits of binary actuation voltages to the M actuating electrodes, where M is larger than the number of bits in each input data word. The digital-to-digital converter maps each digital input data word to a binary actuation vector by selecting a binary actuation vector from a subset of binary actuation vectors available to represent each of the input data words.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 22, 2021
    Date of Patent: May 24, 2022
    Assignee: Ramot at Tel-Aviv University Ltd.
    Inventors: Yossef Ehrlichman, Ofer Amrani, Shlomo Ruschin
  • Patent number: 11329660
    Abstract: VCO ADCs consume relatively little power and require less area than other ADC architectures. However, when a VCO ADC is implemented by itself, the VCO ADC can have limited bandwidth and performance. To address these issues, the VCO ADC is implemented as a back end stage in a VCO-based continuous-time (CT) pipelined ADC, where the VCO-based CT pipelined ADC has a CT residue generation front end. Optionally, the VCO ADC back end has phase interpolation to improve its bandwidth. The pipelined architecture dramatically improves the performance of the VCO ADC back end, and the overall VCO-based CT pipelined ADC is simpler than a traditional continuous-time pipelined ADC.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 15, 2021
    Date of Patent: May 10, 2022
    Assignee: Analog Devices International Unlimited Company
    Inventors: Hajime Shibata, Gerard E. Taylor, Wenhua W. Yang
  • Patent number: 11329678
    Abstract: A receiver system includes an interface between a radio receiver on a radio frequency (RF)-side and a baseband receiver on a baseband (BB)-side. The receiver includes an antenna for receiving radio frequency signals and an analogue-to-digital converter for converting received analogue signals to digital signals. The digital signals are further processed in the baseband receiver by a digital signal processing unit. The analogue-to-digital converter is a sigma-delta converter, which includes a sigma-delta modulator on the RF-side and a decimation filter on the BB-side. The sigma-delta modulator and the decimation filter are connected only by single-bit in-phase (I) and quadrature (Q) streams output lines.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 21, 2018
    Date of Patent: May 10, 2022
    Assignee: COMMSOLID GMBH
    Inventor: Andreas Bury
  • Patent number: 11309909
    Abstract: A compression device includes a dictionary based encoder, a second buffer, a comparator, and a compression data generator. The dictionary based encoder searches for second data at least partially matching first data from a first buffer, and acquires a first match position indicating a position of the second data in the first buffer and a match length indicating a matched length of the first and second data. The second buffer stores the previously acquired second match position with an index. The compression data generator generates first compressed data that includes the index assigned to the second match position in the second buffer and the match length when the first match position matches the second match position in the second buffer.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 2, 2020
    Date of Patent: April 19, 2022
    Assignee: Kioxia Corporation
    Inventors: Youhei Fukazawa, Keiri Nakanishi, Sho Kodama, Masato Sumiyoshi, Kohei Oikawa, Daisuke Yashima, Takashi Miura, Zheye Wang
  • Patent number: 11296715
    Abstract: The inventive concept relates to a method and system for cost-effectively predicting the dynamic nonlinearities of on-chip segmented digital-to-analog converter (DAC) and analog-to-digital-converter (ADC), by looping a DAC to an ADC, using a programmable-gain-amplifier (PGA) and an external load board. The method may include a first loopback step of supplying an output signal from a coarse DAC, to which a sinusoidal signal is supplied, to a coarse ADC and a fine ADC through an external load board, a second loopback step of supplying an output signal from a fine DAC, to which a sinusoidal signal is supplied, to the fine ADC and the coarse ADC through the load board, and a step of predicting dynamic nonlinearity of each of a DAC and an ADC by processing equations exhibiting dynamic nonlinearity of a sub-DAC and a sub-ADC, which are obtained in the first loopback step and the second loopback step.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 26, 2021
    Date of Patent: April 5, 2022
    Assignee: Industry-University Cooperation Foundation Hanyang University ERICA Campus
    Inventor: Byoungho Kim
  • Patent number: 11296720
    Abstract: Systems, apparatus and methods are provided for compressing data. A method may include receiving an input data block to be compressed, determining numbers of occurrences for distinct symbols in the input data block, generating reduced numbers of occurrences for the distinct symbols based on the numbers of occurrences for the distinct symbols and encoding the input data block using the reduced numbers of occurrences as probability distribution of the distinct symbols in the input data block.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 24, 2020
    Date of Patent: April 5, 2022
    Assignee: Innogrit Technologies Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Yuan-Mao Chang, Fang-Ju Ku
  • Patent number: 11296397
    Abstract: A liquid crystal display device including an antenna coil is provided. The device includes a liquid crystal panel; a backlight; and a bezel. The bezel includes a front bezel and a rear bezel, and houses the liquid crystal panel and the backlight using the front bezel and the rear bezel in combination. The front bezel is disposed on a liquid crystal panel side and provided with an opening superposed on a display region of the liquid crystal panel. The rear bezel is disposed on a backlight side and includes an antenna coil formed form a conductive material and an outer edge positioned outside the antenna coil in a plan view. The antenna coil is electrically insulated from the front bezel and the outer edge of the rear bezel.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 4, 2019
    Date of Patent: April 5, 2022
    Assignee: SHARP KABUSHIKI KAISHA
    Inventor: Kohichi Aso
  • Patent number: 11296716
    Abstract: A multi-branch analog multiplexer (anamux) includes protection circuitry to help dissipate both positive and negative injected current without increasing the size of hardening transistors in each branch, thereby avoiding increased leakage current and enabling an analog to digital converter to operate with the required accuracy. The protection circuitry is tied to the body of the hardening transistor to lower the threshold voltage of the hardening device, thereby enabling the hardening device to handle more of the injected current.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 4, 2020
    Date of Patent: April 5, 2022
    Assignee: NXP USA, Inc.
    Inventor: Wenzhong Zhang
  • Patent number: 11296718
    Abstract: Digital-to-analog conversion circuit, digital-to-analog conversion method, display apparatus are disclosed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 16, 2019
    Date of Patent: April 5, 2022
    Assignee: BOE TECHNOLOGY GROUP CO., LTD.
    Inventors: Tangxiang Wang, Chen Song
  • Patent number: 11283464
    Abstract: Compressed domain processors configured to perform operations on data compressed in a format that preserves order. The Compressed domain processors may include operations such as addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, sorting, and searching. In some cases, compression engines for compressing the data into the desired formats are provided.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 11, 2021
    Date of Patent: March 22, 2022
    Assignee: SiliconIP, Inc.
    Inventors: Dan E. Tamir, Dan Bruck
  • Patent number: 11271584
    Abstract: Disclosed is an integrated circuit, which includes a DTC block including DTCs, receiving a first reference signal and a first division signal, and outputting a second reference signal and a second division signal based on the first reference signal, the first division signal, and control codes, a TDC comparing phases of the second reference signal and the second division signal and outputting a comparison signal, a digital loop filter filtering the comparison signal, an oscillator generating an output signal based on the filtered comparison signal, a delta-sigma modulator outputting a first signal and a quantized noise signal based on first and second division ratio signals, a divider dividing a frequency of the output signal based on the first signal and outputting the first division signal, and a probability modulator generating the control codes based on the quantized noise signal. Probability density functions of the control codes are time-invariant.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 27, 2021
    Date of Patent: March 8, 2022
    Assignee: Korean Advanced Institute of Science and Technology
    Inventors: Jaehyouk Choi, Taeho Seong, Yongsun Lee, Chanwoong Hwang, Hangi Park
  • Patent number: 11271576
    Abstract: Certain aspects of the present disclosure provide a digital-to-analog converter (DAC). The DAC generally includes a plurality of current-steering cells, each having a bypass switch, and a resistor ladder circuit having multiple segments. Each segment may include a first resistive element and a second resistive element, the bypass switch being configured to selectively provide a bypass current to a common node between the first resistive element and the second resistive element.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 6, 2021
    Date of Patent: March 8, 2022
    Assignee: QUALCOMM Incorporated
    Inventors: Andrew Weil, Ashok Swaminathan, Siyu Yang
  • Patent number: 11265020
    Abstract: An electronic device configured to perform polar coding is described. The electronic device includes a bit pattern generator (3403) configured to successively perform a bit pattern generation process over a series (t=?n/w?) of clock cycles; and a counter (c, 4203), operably coupled to the bit pattern generator (3403) and configured to count a number of successive bit pattern generation sub-processes over the series (t=?n/w?) of clock cycles. The bit pattern generator (3403) is configured to: provide a successive sub-set of (w) bits from a bit pattern vector (bk,n) in each successive t=?n/w? clock cycle; where the bit pattern vector comprises n bits, of which ‘k’ bits adopt a first binary value and n?k bits adopt a complementary binary value.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 26, 2021
    Date of Patent: March 1, 2022
    Assignee: AccelerComm Limited
    Inventors: Robert Maunder, Matthew Brejza, Shida Zhong, Isaac Perez-Andrade, Taihai Chen
  • Patent number: 11264691
    Abstract: An antenna with a heater and method for using the same are disclosed. The antenna may comprise: an antenna aperture having a plurality of radio-frequency radiating antenna elements, the antenna aperture having a ground plane and a material for tuning permittivity or capacitance; and a heater structure in thermal contact with the material.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 13, 2020
    Date of Patent: March 1, 2022
    Assignee: KYMETA CORPORATION
    Inventors: Cagdas Varel, Steven Howard Linn, Ryan A. Stevenson, Colin Stuart Short
  • Patent number: 11265005
    Abstract: An analog-digital conversion apparatus may include a control unit configured for receiving an analog-digital (AD) conversion request from a plurality of processing modules; and an analog-digital converter (ADC) configured for performing analog-digital conversion according to the AD conversion request received from the control unit, in which the control unit is configured to integrate the AD conversion request according to periodicity of the AD conversion request and to transfer the integrated AD conversion request to the ADC.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 4, 2020
    Date of Patent: March 1, 2022
    Assignee: HYUNDAI AUTOEVER CORP.
    Inventor: Jun Ho Cho
  • Patent number: 11258453
    Abstract: A pipelined ADC that does not wait for the residue of a signal to settle to be delivered to the next stage of the pipeline, and thus passes signals to subsequent stages at faster than conventional speeds. A pipelined ADC is used that processes signals representing the boundaries of the search space. Thus, each stage does not necessarily receive the signal as pre-processed by the prior stage, but rather the search space boundaries as pre-processed by the prior stage. Reducing the “search space” of the ADC is equivalent to creating the residues in each step of a pipeline as in the prior art. An ADC operating in this fashion operates without error even if the residual search space boundary outputs from one state are presented to the next stage before the outputs have settled, and can run faster for a given power and bandwidth.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 8, 2021
    Date of Patent: February 22, 2022
    Assignee: SiliconIntervention Inc.
    Inventor: A. Martin Mallinson
  • Patent number: 11258459
    Abstract: Methods and apparatus to parallelize data decompression are disclosed. An example method selecting initial starting positions in a compressed data bitstream; adjusting a first one of the initial starting positions to determine a first adjusted starting position by decoding the bitstream starting at a training position in the bitstream, the decoding including traversing the bitstream from the training position as though first data located at the training position is a valid token; outputting first decoded data generated by decoding a first segment of the bitstream starting from the first adjusted starting position; and merging the first decoded data with second decoded data generated by decoding a second segment of the bitstream, the decoding of the second segment starting from a second position in the bitstream and being performed in parallel with the decoding of the first segment, and the second segment preceding the first segment in the bitstream.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 18, 2020
    Date of Patent: February 22, 2022
    Assignee: INTEL CORPORATION
    Inventors: Vinodh Gopal, James D. Guilford, Sudhir K. Satpathy, Sanu K. Mathew