Design of Integrated CMOS Circuits for Parallel Detection and Storage of Optical Data.

摘要

A CMOS circuit capable of storing optically transmitted data from a holographic read only memory (ROM) is described. The investigation focuses on combining optical and electronic circuit technology to rapidly transfer data in parallel fashion from a ROM to an array of static random-access memory (SRAM) cells. The proposed optoelectronic SRAM cells have an optical detection components as well as electrical read and write functions. Development of the optoelectronic memory circuit is based on research in several areas. A design method is described which applies MOS inverter transfer characteristics to the six-transistor CMOS SRAM cell. Circuit diagrams, layouts, and models are presented for photodetection devices adapted to integrated CMOS circuits. These devices are fabricated in standard CMOS processes for silicon. Performance characteristics are provided for photodetection devices with different load circuits. The optical data transfer technology is extended to other systems in which high speed and parallelism are essential. An array of the optoelectronic cells and many related devices and circuits have been designed, fabricated, and tested. Simulation and experimental results are given for circuits applicable to optical detection and electronic storage of data. The optical data transfer concept has been verified with a 16-bit optoelectronic SRAM. Data contained in a parallel array of 16 light beams with an average power of 3.35 microwatts per bit were successfully transferred to the SRAM. Theses.