Do We Have RF Performance

Degradation Due To Substrate

Noise?
Domine Leenaerts
Philips Research Labs.




Domine Leenaerts, Workshop on Substrate Noise-coupling in Mixed-Signal ICs






 Contents
• Introduction to substrate noise-coupling.
• What can we do; guard rings.
• Is this enough? RF examples.
• Conclusions.


Domine Leenaerts, Workshop on Substrate Noise-coupling in Mixed-Signal ICs









 Introduction
• Substrate is connecting layer between all
circuits on a single die.
• If a circuit produces spiky signals (‘noise’) on
the substrate, other circuits will ‘feel’ this.
• Amount of generated noise on substrate is
therefore an issue.
You can minimise the influence of substrate
coupling but not eliminate it.





Domine Leenaerts, Workshop on Substrate Noise-coupling in Mixed-Signal ICs










 Introduction; injection paths
• PN-junction of MOS (mainly in digital circuits)
– capacitive coupling to substrate
– can be several hundreds pico Farad for digital
• N-Well
– forms PN-junction with substrate
– capacitive coupling between Vdd and substrate
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 Introduction; injection paths

• Bond wires
– MOS logic produces spikes on supply lines
– Vss tightly connected to substrate
– vdrop = Lbondwire ⋅ dI spike / dt
– off-chip, digital ground connected to substrate
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 Introduction; reception paths
• Bulk contacts
– substrate is connected to ground via bulk contacts
– resistive coupling
• PN-junction MOS / N-Well
– capacitive coupling into supply lines
– capacitive coupling into signal lines
• Backgate MOS
– injection into signal path
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 Introduction
• Used technology is important
– high resistive substrate
– low resistive substrate on high resistive epi
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 Introduction; problem?
• 2nd order low pass Sigma-Delta Mod
• 0.25 µm CMOS, 10 mΩ.cm substrate on top of
11 Ω.cm epi of 3 µm
• 1.8 V supply voltage
• separate digital/analogue power lines
• design rules to minimise substrate bounces
applied
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 Introduction; problem?

8 bit

13.5 MHz
1 MHz
Filter Quantizer Decimation

DAC
1 bit
216 MHz
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 Introduction; problem?

20dB

Clock off Clock on

Measured spectrum of signal at substrate

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 What can we do?
Some people claim that you must use p-guard
rings and n-guard rings around your circuits.

We have tested this opinion for a 0.18 µm CMOS

technology using high and low resistive substrate
(J. Pluymakers et.al. PS-LTG AMOS)
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 Guard rings
• 10 mΩ.cm substrate of
Vdd

200 µm on top of 11
Ω.cm epi of 3
• 10 Ω.cm substrate of 200
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 Guard rings

13 dB improvement of suppression relative to the situation without P-ring

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 Guard rings

Only 4 dB improvement!
N-Ring deteriorates the effect of the P-ring
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 Guard rings; low ohmic substrate
• N-ring around RF circuit does not help you
• P-ring around RF circuit gives -13 dB
improvement compared to no ring
– Nail the substrate as good as possible to the ground
• Use N-ring only around your source of noise
– collect ‘wandering’ electrons
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 Guard rings; high ohmic substrate
• N-ring around RF circuit does not help you
• P-ring around RF circuit gives -40 dB
improvement compared to no ring
• Place source as far away as possible
– 50 µm: -34 dB, 100 µm: -40 dB (reference: -24 dB)
• Use N-ring only around your source of noise
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 Is this enough?
• Consider the low ohmic substrate
• Can the substrate noise influence the RF
performance of a certain circuit?

• Test circuit in 0.25 µm CMOS, 10 mΩ.cm

substrate on top of 11 Ω.cm epi of 3 µm
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 RF example: circuit
Vtune

• 11-stage ring oscillator

clock out
• center freq. 772 MHz 1 2 11 buffer
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• Unmatched LNA: 2-5 GHz substrate

• Wafer probe measurements: 0.2 -15

substrate noise due to pn-

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 RF example: circuit
• Spectrum substrate
• inside guard ring fundamental

• LNA off 2nd harmonic

3rd harmonic
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 RF example: circuit

2.3 GHz 2.3 GHz & 3rd

harmonic of
772 MHz 772 MHz

Only LNA is operational @ 2.3 LNA and clock operational; spectrum at

GHz; spectrum at output LNA output LNA
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 RF example: circuit; conclusion
• Not only amplified RF input signal at output
LNA, but also (weakened) injected substrate
noise at the drain. DISTORTION!
• If LNA has gain, then substrate noise injected at
RF input will be amplified.
• S-parameters did not change, performance LNA
is not changed due to substrate noise.
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 RF example: system
• What if you have large digital circuitry and RF
circuitry on the same substrate?

• Test circuit in 0.18 µm CMOS, 10 Ω.cm

substrate
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 RF example: system
• RF front-end @ 2.45
GHz
• 500 kgates digital
• 1.8 V


Domine Leenaerts, Workshop on Substrate Noise-coupling in Mixed-Signal ICs






 RF example: system
• VCO runs at 2.45 GHz
• Clock for digital is tuneable
• Measure output spectrum VCO





Domine Leenaerts, Workshop on Substrate Noise-coupling in Mixed-Signal ICs












 RF example: system

Clock digital off Clock digital: 13 MHz



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Clock digital: 40 MHz Clock digital: 64 MHz

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 RF example: system; conclusion
• FM modulation between digital clock switching
and VCO
• Can not be prevented by guard ring techniques.
• Only smart system design can minimise the
effects of substrate noise on system
performance
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 Concluding remarks
• Yes, substrate noise coupling is an important
issue in RF design
• Yes, guard rings together with high ohmic
substrate reduce the coupling
• Yes, smart system and circuit design can reduce
it too
• No, you can not eliminate it
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