Shadi Saberi Ghouchani Carnegie Mellon University

Very Low Power, Adaptive Equalizer for High-Speed Communications

With the increase in the speed of I/O serial links and optical communication systems beyond 10 Gb/s, communication channels become the barrier on the way to further improving the data rate, due to imperfections at high frequencies. One of the most important limitations is due to inter-symbol interference (ISI), caused by the fact that the channel response has a low-pass characteristic.

To reduce ISI, various equalizers have been devised. Despite of the existence of a vast amount of DSP algorithms to achieve optimum ISI reduction, digital/discrete-time equalizers work at a low data rate and consume a lot of power. Conventional continuous-time equalizers utilize active circuitries to obtain gain boosting in high frequencies, thus compensating for the channel loss. However, the power consumption is significant, especially at frequencies higher than 10 GHz.

In this talk, a low-power, continuous-time adaptive passive equalizer relying on an on-chip lumped RLC filter to reduce the power consumption and improve the attainable data rate is presented. A modified continuous-time adaptation servo loop is integrated into the system to automatically adjust the frequency response of the passive equalizer for the optimal gain compensation.

Bio:

Shadi Saberi Ghouchani earned her B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering in 2005 from Sharif University, Tehran, Iran. She joined the ECE Department at Carnegie Mellon University the same year. She is currently a direct Ph.D. student under the guidance of Professors Patrick Yue and Larry Pileggi. Her research interest is high-speed analog and RF circuit design.