Description:
Reference #: 1713
The University of South Carolina is offering licensing opportunities for Design and structures of high-speed interconnects for improved signal integrity.
Background:
In recent years, significant advances in processing techniques have propelled the development of devices with heightened complexity, facilitating the integration of greater amounts of logics and transistors onto miniaturized integrated circuits and chips, which instigate a discernible trend towards increasing densities on printed circuit boards (PCB) and silicon dies, aimed at pursuing systems featuring with higher speed, wider bandwidth, and smaller size. Consequently, the electromagnetic performance of the interconnects plays a pivotal role in electronic systems as it directly impacts their signal integrity, due to suboptimal interconnects have the potential to introduce undesired electromagnetic interference (EMI), thereby compromising the quality of high-speed signal transmission.
As signals are proximately positioned, crosstalk noise arises due to electric and magnetic coupling between traces. Actually, electromagnetic crosstalk poses a significant challenge in electronic systems, especially with the increasing demand for miniaturization and high-speed transfer. Typically, the capacitive coupling between adjacent interconnects tends to be smaller compared to the inductive coupling, leading to the occurrence of far-end crosstalk (FEXT). To effectively mitigate FEXT in practical applications, various methods have been applied in the industry world, including shielding, optimizing the geometry of interconnects, employing advanced materials, etc. For a practical instance, Intel Corporation has proposed a surface tab routing method for reducing crosstalk to enhance double data rate (DDR) channel performance. Theoretically, crosstalk issues can be eliminated by providing adequate spacing between traces. However, in the high-density PCB package, signal channels often need to be proximately placed, leading to degradation in FEXT performance. To tackle this challenge and concurrently realize the reduced FEXT and the high-speed data transfer within a confined space, the surface tab routing method introduced interdigital trapezoidal tabs along the signal traces, which enables the closely placed traces to have a reduced FEXT.
Invention Description:
This invention introduces a novel design methodology and new interconnected structures, which includes integrating the interdigital trapezoidal tabs and defected microstrip line to effectively reduce far-end crosstalk via eliminating the difference between capacitive coupling and inductive coupling of neighboring interconnects, thereby reducing FEXT.
Potential Applications:
Telecommunications
Advantages and Benefits:
Existing techniques involves integrating trapezoidal tabs, utilized by companies like Intel, Cisco, and TI, etc. to reduce far-end crosstalk between traces and enhance the signal integrity of transmission to some degree. However, this invention introduces two designs that significantly improve FEXT reduction to a greater extent. Implementing these designs could lead to the development of more compact integrated circuits capable of improved signal integrity with ease of fabrication and low cost. Consequently, this innovation could be more competitive in the market.