A. Rocchi

Platform Based Design for Automotive Sensor Conditioning

A general architecture suitable for interfacing several kinds of sensors for automotive applications is presented. A platform based design approach is pursued to improve system performance while minimizing time-to-market. The platform is composed of an analog front-end and a digital section. The latter is based on a microcontroller core (8051 IP by Oregano) plus a set of hardware dedicated to the complex signal processing required for sensor conditioning. The microcontroller also handles the communication with external devices (such as a PC) for data output and fast prototyping. A case study is presented concerning the conditioning of a gyro yaw rate sensor for automotive applications. Measured performance results outperform current state-of-the-art commercial devices.

An Integrated Flow from pre-Silicon Simulation to post-Silicon Verification

This paper presents an integrated flow to bridge the existing gap from pre-silicon simulation to post-silicon verification environments. This flow features automatic reproduction in lab of the test-bench used in simulation and sharing of data between design and test environments. A design for testability (DFT) approach has been also used to increase the controllability and observability of the system. This integrated flow has been successfully used to validate a mixed-signal IC developed by SensorDynamicsAG for sensor conditioning leading to time and cost reduction and to an increased reliability and quality of the overall test phase (simulation and verification)

Low-g accelerometer fast prototyping for automotive applications

This paper presents an application of the ISIF chip (intelligent sensor interface), for conditioning a dual-axis low-g accelerometer in MEMS technology. MEMS are nowadays the standard in automotive applications (and not only), as they feature a drastic reduction in cost, area and power, while they require a more complex electronic interface with respect to traditional discrete devices. ISIF is a platform on chip implementation, aiming to fast prototype a wide range of automotive sensors thanks to its high configuration resources, achieved both by full analog / digital IPs trimming options and by flexible routing structures. This accelerometer implementation exploits a relevant part of ISIF hardware resources, but also requires signal processing add-ins (software emulation of digital DSP blocks) for the closed loop conditioning architecture and for performance improvement (for example temperature drift compensation). In spite the short prototyping time, the resulting system achieves good performances with respect to commercial devices, featuring a 0.9 mg/radicHz noise density with 1024 LSB/g sensitivity on the digital output over a +/- 2g FS, and an offset drift over 100degC range within 30 mg, with 2% of FS sensitivity drift. Miniboards have been developed as product prototypes, consisting of a small PCB with ISIF and accelerometer dies bonded together, firmware embedded in EEPROM and communication transceivers

Sensor platform design for automotive applications

This paper presents a prototyping environment suited to fast identify, trim and verify a digital sensor interface in the automotive field, and to make early performance evaluations before proceed towards the final ASIC product. The overall platform is composed by hardware blocks and software tools suitable for the design space exploration, while a proper verification methodology is being adopted to guarantee the correct system behavior. In order to tune the platform architecture with an application case and at the same time to demonstrate its flexibility, two case examples are being examined.

Mixed signal behavioral verification using VHDL-AMS

In this paper we describe a methodology to set up a behavioral verification for complex mixed-signal Systemon-Chip (SoC). The verification flow, consisting in VHDL-AMS modeling of the analog and mixed-signal section of a generic system, is depicted. This methodology has been successfully adopted for the top level debugging of a mixed signal SoC for sensor interface.

FPGA-based Advanced Digital Signal Inspector for internal signals of pin-limited systems-on-package

The paper presents an Advanced Digital Signal Inspector (ADSI) used for acquisition and analysis of the internal digital of a System on Package (SoP) with a limited number of pins. The system is made of a commercial FPGA-board, connected to the module for data sampling and controlled by PC via USB; a suited graphical interface allows for configuration, multi trace real time data display and post processing. The proposed platform can be used to extract and monitor simultaneously up to 4 digital signals, and an ADC is used to monitor one additional analog signal. The ADSI has been successfully applied for the characterization of an automotive SoP based on a MEM gyro sensor interfaced to an ASIC for proper signal conditioning. The ADC was connected to an external accelerometer to evaluate the module behaviour when applying mechanical shocks.

Shock immunity enhancement via resonance damping in gyroscopes for automotive applications

This paper presents an innovative and effective method to improve the performance of a micro mechanical gyroscope by introducing the damping of its sensing quality factor. Indeed the sensing quality factor is a key parameter for the micro mechanical gyroscope dynamic; particularly high sensing quality factor means long settling time, high response overshoot and high sensitivity to external disturbances (shocks and vibrations) that are typical of harsh automotive environment. For this reason micro mechanical gyroscopes employed in automotive environment need high shock and vibration immunity. This paper proposes a solution to reach this goal by adding a ldquovirtual dampingrdquo to the system with an electrostatic feedback technique. This approach has been applied to a real automotive yaw gyro system, and simulations performed using Simulinktrade environment show an appreciable output overshoot reduction, with the benefit of higher vibration immunity, once implemented the feedback technique.

Efficient acquisition and analysis of digital signals in pin-limited system-on-package.

The paper presents an advanced digital signal inspector (ADSI) used for acquisition and analysis of the internal digital of a System on Package (SoP) with a limited number of pins. The system is made of a commercial FPGA- board, connected to the module for data sampling and controlled by PC via USB; a suited graphical interface allows for configuration, multi trace real time data display and post processing. The proposed platform can be used to extract and monitor simultaneously up to 4 digital signals, and an ADC is used to monitor one further analog signal. The ADSI has been successfully applied for the characterization of an automotive SoP based on a MEM gyro sensor interfaced to an ASIC for proper signal conditioning. The ADC was connected to an external accelerometer to evaluate the SoP behaviour when applying mechanical shocks.