TITLE:
Characterization of a Novel Low-Power SRAM Bit-Cell Structure at Deep Sub-Micron CMOS Technology for Multimedia Applications
AUTHORS:
Rakesh Kumar Singh, Manisha Pattanaik, Neeraj Kr. Shukla
KEYWORDS:
SRAM; Low-Power; Active Power; Standby Power; Gate Leakage; Sub-Threshold Leakage
JOURNAL NAME:
Circuits and Systems,
Vol.3 No.1,
December
31,
2011
ABSTRACT: To meet the increasing demands for higher performance and low-power consumption in present and future Systems-on-Chips (SoCs) require a large amount of on-die/embedded memory. In Deep-Sub-Micron (DSM) technology, it is coming as challenges, e.g., leakage power, performance, data retentation, and stability issues. In this work, we have proposed a novel low-stress SRAM cell, called as IP3 SRAM bit-cell, as an integrated cell. It has a separate write sub-cell and read sub-cell, where the write sub-cell has dual role of data write and data hold. The data read sub-cell is proposed as a pMOS gated ground scheme to further reduce the read power by lowering the gate and subthreshold leakage currents. The drowsy voltage is applied to the cell when the memory is in the standby mode. Further, it utilizes the full-supply body biasing scheme while the memory is in the standby mode, to further reduce the subthreshold leakage current to reduce the overall standby power. To the best of our knowledge, this low-stress memory cell has been proposed for the first time. The proposed IP3 SRAM Cell has a significant write and read power reduction as compared to the conventional 6 T and PP SRAM cells and overall improved read stability and write ability performances. The proposed design is being simulated at VDD = 0.8 V and 0.7 V and an analysis is presented here for 0.8 V to adhere previously reported works. The other design parameters are taken from the CMOS technology available on 45 nm with tOX = 2.4 nm, Vthn = 0.224 V, and Vthp = 0.24 V at T = 27?C.