Certain aspects of the present disclosure generally relate to radio frequency (RF) electronic circuits and, more particularly, to generating multiple oscillating signals having different phases.
Wireless communication networks are widely deployed to provide various communication services such as telephony, video, data, messaging, broadcasts, and so on. Such networks, which are usually multiple access networks, support communications for multiple users by sharing the available network resources. For example, one network may be a 3G (the third generation of mobile phone standards and technology) system, which may provide network service via any one of various 3G radio access technologies (RATs) including EVDO (Evolution-Data Optimized), 1×RTT (1 times Radio Transmission Technology, or simply 1×), W-CDMA (Wideband Code Division Multiple Access), UMTS-TDD (Universal Mobile Telecommunications System-Time Division Duplexing), HSPA (High Speed Packet Access), GPRS (General Packet Radio Service), or EDGE (Enhanced Data rates for Global Evolution). The 3G network is a wide area cellular telephone network that evolved to incorporate high-speed internet access and video telephony, in addition to voice calls. Furthermore, a 3G network may be more established and provide larger coverage areas than other network systems. Such multiple access networks may also include code division multiple access (CDMA) systems, time division multiple access (TDMA) systems, frequency division multiple access (FDMA) systems, orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) systems, single-carrier FDMA (SC-FDMA) networks, 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Long Term Evolution (LTE) networks, and Long Term Evolution Advanced (LTE-A) networks.
A wireless communication network may include a number of base stations that can support communication for a number of mobile stations. A mobile station (MS) may communicate with a base station (BS) via a downlink and an uplink. The downlink (or forward link) refers to the communication link from the base station to the mobile station, and the uplink (or reverse link) refers to the communication link from the mobile station to the base station. A base station may transmit data and control information on the downlink to a mobile station and/or may receive data and control information on the uplink from the mobile station.
Certain aspects of the present disclosure generally relate to generating multiple oscillating signals having different phases (i.e., multiphase oscillating signal generation).
Certain aspects of the present disclosure provide a multiphase generating circuit. The circuit generally includes a first phase shifting circuit configured to phase shift an input signal having an input frequency, such that an output signal of the first phase shifting circuit has a first phase difference with respect to the input signal; a first frequency dividing circuit configured to receive the input signal and output a first set of signals having a first frequency less than the input frequency of the input signal; and a second frequency dividing circuit configured to receive the output signal of the first phase shifting circuit and output a second set of signals having a second frequency less than the input frequency of the input signal.
According to certain aspects, the first frequency equals the second frequency. The first frequency and the second frequency may both be half the input frequency.
According to certain aspects, the first phase shifting circuit comprises a delay line. For certain aspects, the delay line is adjustable, such that the first phase difference is a variable phase difference with respect to the input signal.
According to certain aspects, at least one of the first frequency dividing circuit or the second frequency dividing circuit includes a frequency divide-by-2 circuit.
According to certain aspects, signals in the first set have phase differences of 0°, 90°, 180°, and 270° with respect to a reference signal. The reference signal is one of the first set of signals. In this case, signals in the second set may have phase differences of 45°, 135°, 225°, and 315° with respect to the reference signal.
According to certain aspects, the multiphase generating circuit is an 8-phase generating circuit. In other aspects, the multiphase generating circuit is a 16-phase generating circuit.
According to certain aspects, the input signal is a voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) signal.
According to certain aspects, the input signal is a differential signal having a positive signal and a negative signal. For certain aspects, the first phase shifting circuit is configured to phase shift the negative signal. For other aspects, the phase shifting circuit is configured to phase shift the positive signal.
According to certain aspects, the multiphase generating circuit further includes a second phase shifting circuit configured to phase shift the output signal of the first phase shifting circuit, such that an output signal of the second phase shifting circuit has a second phase difference with respect to the output signal of the first phase shifting circuit. For certain aspects, the second phase shifting circuit comprises an adjustable delay line, such that the second phase difference is a variable phase difference with respect to the output signal of the first phase shifting circuit. The second phase difference may be nominally 90°. A sum of the first phase difference and the second phase difference may be nominally 180°.
For certain aspects, the multiphase generating circuit further includes a calibration circuit configured to receive the input signal and the output signal of the second phase shifting circuit and to adjust at least one of the first or second phase difference based on relative timing of the input signal and the output signal of the second phase shifting circuit. The calibration circuit may include a phase comparator and a finite state machine. The phase comparator may be configured to compare edges of the input signal with edges of the output signal of the second phase shifting circuit; and to output a comparison signal indicating whether the edges of the input signal are earlier or later than the edges of the output signal of the second phase shifting circuit. The finite state machine may be configured to receive the comparison signal and to control increasing or decreasing a parameter affecting the at least one of the first or second phase difference based on the comparison signal.
According to certain aspects, the first phase difference is nominally 90°.
According to certain aspects, the multiphase generating circuit further includes a second phase shifting circuit configured to phase shift the output signal of the first phase shifting circuit, such that an output signal of the second phase shifting circuit has a second phase difference with respect to the output signal of the first phase shifting circuit; and a third frequency dividing circuit configured to receive the output signal of the second phase shifting circuit and output a third set of signals having a third frequency less than the input frequency of the input signal. For certain aspects, the multiphase generating circuit further includes a third phase shifting circuit configured to phase shift the output signal of the second phase shifting circuit, such that an output signal of the third phase shifting circuit has a third phase difference with respect to the output signal of the second phase shifting circuit; and a fourth frequency dividing circuit configured to receive the output signal of the third phase shifting circuit and output a fourth set of signals having a fourth frequency less than the input frequency of the input signal.
According to certain aspects, the multiphase generating circuit further includes a fourth phase shifting circuit configured to phase shift the output signal of the third phase shifting circuit, such that an output signal of the fourth phase shifting circuit has a fourth phase difference with respect to the output signal of the third phase shifting circuit. The fourth phase difference may nominally be 90°. For certain aspects, the fourth phase shifting circuit is an adjustable delay line, such that the fourth phase difference is a variable phase difference with respect to the output signal of the third phase shifting circuit. A sum of the first phase difference, the second phase difference, the third phase difference, and the fourth phase difference may nominally be 180°.
Certain aspects of the present disclosure provide a method for multiphase signal generation. The method generally includes frequency dividing an input signal to generate a first set of signals having a first frequency less than an input frequency of the input signal; phase shifting the input signal to produce a first output signal having a first phase difference with respect to the input signal; and frequency dividing the first output signal to generate a second set of signals having a second frequency less than the input frequency.
Certain aspects of the present disclosure provide an apparatus for multiphase signal generation. The apparatus generally includes means for frequency dividing an input signal to generate a first set of signals having a first frequency less than an input frequency of the input signal; means for phase shifting the input signal to produce a first output signal having a first phase difference with respect to the input signal; and means for frequency dividing the first output signal to generate a second set of signals having a second frequency less than the input frequency.
So that the manner in which the above-recited features of the present disclosure can be understood in detail, a more particular description, briefly summarized above, may be had by reference to aspects, some of which are illustrated in the appended drawings. It is to be noted, however, that the appended drawings illustrate only certain typical aspects of this disclosure and are therefore not to be considered limiting of its scope, for the description may admit to other equally effective aspects.
Various aspects of the present disclosure are described below. It should be apparent that the teachings herein may be embodied in a wide variety of forms and that any specific structure, function, or both being disclosed herein is merely representative. Based on the teachings herein, one skilled in the art should appreciate that an aspect disclosed herein may be implemented independently of any other aspects and that two or more of these aspects may be combined in various ways. For example, an apparatus may be implemented or a method may be practiced using any number of the aspects set forth herein. In addition, such an apparatus may be implemented or such a method may be practiced using other structure, functionality, or structure and functionality in addition to or other than one or more of the aspects set forth herein. Furthermore, an aspect may comprise at least one element of a claim.
The word “exemplary” is used herein to mean “serving as an example, instance, or illustration.” Any aspect described herein as “exemplary” is not necessarily to be construed as preferred or advantageous over other aspects.
The techniques described herein may be used in combination with various wireless technologies such as Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA), Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM), Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA), Spatial Division Multiple Access (SDMA), Single Carrier Frequency Division Multiple Access (SC-FDMA), Time Division Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access (TD-SCDMA), and the like. Multiple user terminals can concurrently transmit/receive data via different (1) orthogonal code channels for CDMA, (2) time slots for TDMA, or (3) sub-bands for OFDM. A CDMA system may implement IS-2000, IS-95, IS-856, Wideband-CDMA (W-CDMA), or some other standards. An OFDM system may implement Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.11 (Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN)), IEEE 802.16 (Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX)), Long Term Evolution (LTE) (e.g., in TDD and/or FDD modes), or some other standards. A TDMA system may implement Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) or some other standards. These various standards are known in the art. The techniques described herein may also be implemented in any of various other suitable wireless systems using radio frequency (RF) technology, including Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), Bluetooth, IEEE 802.15 (Wireless Personal Area Network (WPAN)), Near Field Communication (NFC), Small Cell, Frequency Modulation (FM), and the like.
Access point 110 may communicate with one or more user terminals 120 at any given moment on the downlink and uplink. The downlink (i.e., forward link) is the communication link from the access point to the user terminals, and the uplink (i.e., reverse link) is the communication link from the user terminals to the access point. A user terminal may also communicate peer-to-peer with another user terminal. A system controller 130 couples to and provides coordination and control for the access points.
System 100 employs multiple transmit and multiple receive antennas for data transmission on the downlink and uplink. Access point 110 may be equipped with a number Nap of antennas to achieve transmit diversity for downlink transmissions and/or receive diversity for uplink transmissions. A set Nu of selected user terminals 120 may receive downlink transmissions and transmit uplink transmissions. Each selected user terminal transmits user-specific data to and/or receives user-specific data from the access point. In general, each selected user terminal may be equipped with one or multiple antennas (i.e., Nut≧1). The Nu selected user terminals can have the same or different number of antennas.
Wireless system 100 may be a time division duplex (TDD) system or a frequency division duplex (FDD) system. For a TDD system, the downlink and uplink may share the same frequency band. For an FDD system, the downlink and uplink use different frequency bands. System 100 may also utilize a single carrier or multiple carriers for transmission. Each user terminal may be equipped with a single antenna (e.g., in order to keep costs down) or multiple antennas (e.g., where the additional cost can be supported).
On the uplink, at each user terminal 120 selected for uplink transmission, a TX data processor 288 receives traffic data from a data source 286 and control data from a controller 280. TX data processor 288 processes (e.g., encodes, interleaves, and modulates) the traffic data {dup} for the user terminal based on the coding and modulation schemes associated with the rate selected for the user terminal and provides a data symbol stream {sup} for one of the Nut,m antennas. A transceiver front end (TX/RX) 254 (also known as a radio frequency front end (RFFE)) receives and processes (e.g., converts to analog, amplifies, filters, and frequency upconverts) a respective symbol stream to generate an uplink signal. The transceiver front end 254 may also route the uplink signal to one of the Nut,m antennas for transmit diversity via an RF switch, for example. The controller 280 may control the routing within the transceiver front end 254.
A number Nup of user terminals may be scheduled for simultaneous transmission on the uplink. Each of these user terminals transmits its set of processed symbol streams on the uplink to the access point.
At access point 110, Nap antennas 224a through 224ap receive the uplink signals from all Nup user terminals transmitting on the uplink. For receive diversity, a transceiver front end 222 may select signals received from one of the antennas 224 for processing. For certain aspects of the present disclosure, a combination of the signals received from multiple antennas 224 may be combined for enhanced receive diversity. The access point's transceiver front end 222 also performs processing complementary to that performed by the user terminal's transceiver front end 254 and provides a recovered uplink data symbol stream. The recovered uplink data symbol stream is an estimate of a data symbol stream {sup} transmitted by a user terminal. An RX data processor 242 processes (e.g., demodulates, deinterleaves, and decodes) the recovered uplink data symbol stream in accordance with the rate used for that stream to obtain decoded data. The decoded data for each user terminal may be provided to a data sink 244 for storage and/or a controller 230 for further processing.
On the downlink, at access point 110, a TX data processor 210 receives traffic data from a data source 208 for Ndn user terminals scheduled for downlink transmission, control data from a controller 230 and possibly other data from a scheduler 234. The various types of data may be sent on different transport channels. TX data processor 210 processes (e.g., encodes, interleaves, and modulates) the traffic data for each user terminal based on the rate selected for that user terminal TX data processor 210 may provide a downlink data symbol streams for one of more of the Ndn user terminals to be transmitted from one of the Nap antennas. The transceiver front end 222 receives and processes (e.g., converts to analog, amplifies, filters, and frequency upconverts) the symbol stream to generate a downlink signal. The transceiver front end 222 may also route the downlink signal to one or more of the Nap antennas 224 for transmit diversity via an RF switch, for example. The controller 230 may control the routing within the transceiver front end 222.
At each user terminal 120, Nut,m antennas 252 receive the downlink signals from access point 110. For receive diversity at the user terminal 120, the transceiver front end 254 may select signals received from one of the antennas 252 for processing. For certain aspects of the present disclosure, a combination of the signals received from multiple antennas 252 may be combined for enhanced receive diversity. The user terminal's transceiver front end 254 also performs processing complementary to that performed by the access point's transceiver front end 222 and provides a recovered downlink data symbol stream. An RX data processor 270 processes (e.g., demodulates, deinterleaves, and decodes) the recovered downlink data symbol stream to obtain decoded data for the user terminal.
Those skilled in the art will recognize the techniques described herein may be generally applied in systems utilizing any type of multiple access schemes, such as TDMA, SDMA, Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA), CDMA, SC-FDMA, and combinations thereof.
Receiving in-phase (I) or quadrature (Q) baseband analog signals from a digital-to-analog converter (DAC) 308, the TX path 302 may include a baseband filter (BBF) 310, a mixer 312, a driver amplifier (DA) 314, and a power amplifier 316. The BBF 310, the mixer 312, and the DA 314 may be included in a radio frequency integrated circuit (RFIC), while the PA 316 is often external to the RFIC. The BBF 310 filters the baseband signals received from the DAC 308, and the mixer 312 mixes the filtered baseband signals with a transmit local oscillator (LO) signal to convert the baseband signal of interest to a different frequency (e.g., upconvert from baseband to RF). This frequency conversion process produces the sum and difference frequencies of the LO frequency and the frequency of the signal of interest. The sum and difference frequencies are referred to as the beat frequencies. The beat frequencies are typically in the RF range, such that the signals output by the mixer 312 are typically RF signals, which are amplified by the DA 314 and by the PA 316 before transmission by the antenna 303.
The RX path 304 includes a low noise amplifier (LNA) 322, a mixer 324, and a baseband filter (BBF) 326. The LNA 322, the mixer 324, and the BBF 326 may be included in a radio frequency integrated circuit (RFIC), which may or may not be the same RFIC that includes the TX path components. RF signals received via the antenna 303 may be amplified by the LNA 322, and the mixer 324 mixes the amplified RF signals with a receive local oscillator (LO) signal to convert the RF signal of interest to a different baseband frequency (i.e., downconvert). The baseband signals output by the mixer 324 may be filtered by the BBF 326 before being converted by an analog-to-digital converter (ADC) 328 to digital I or Q signals for digital signal processing.
While it is desirable for the output of an LO to remain stable in frequency, tuning to different frequencies indicates using a variable-frequency oscillator, which involves compromises between stability and tunability. Contemporary systems employ frequency synthesizers with a voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) to generate a stable, tunable LO with a particular tuning range. Thus, the transmit LO is typically produced by a TX frequency synthesizer 318, which may be buffered or amplified by amplifier 320 before being mixed with the baseband signals in the mixer 312. Similarly, the receive LO is typically produced by an RX frequency synthesizer 330, which may be buffered or amplified by amplifier 332 before being mixed with the RF signals in the mixer 324.
Generation of multiple phases of the VCO or LO signals has many useful applications, such as in N-path filtering or fast frequency measurement of the VCO or LO. Multiple oscillating signals having different phases (i.e., multiphase oscillating signals) may be generated using a ring-oscillator (e.g., in an injection-locked frequency divider (ILFD)). However, the obtainable phase noise (e.g., integrated phase noise (IPN)) is not sufficient for most wireless applications. Furthermore, a ring-oscillator may take up significant circuit area, which may not be available in some designs. Another approach to multiphase signal generation involves using cascaded frequency dividers, where particular outputs of one stage are used in the next stage of frequency dividers. With this approach, however, the multiphase signals are generally at a much lower frequency than the input signal, depending on the number of divider stages. Thus, the obtainable frequency limits the applications for this approach.
Accordingly, what is needed are techniques and apparatus for multiphase signal generation with reduced phase noise, decreased circuit area, and/or higher frequency compared to conventional approaches.
Certain aspects of the present disclosure provide for multiphase signal generation using one or more phase shifters and two or more frequency dividers to generate 8 or more multiphase signals. The multiphase signals operate with a frequency one half that of the input oscillating signal frequency (fVCO). In this manner, the frequency of the input oscillating signal may be effectively measured at least four times faster (4fVCO) than using a single phase of the input signal.
The input signal generator 402 may be configured to generate an input oscillating signal, such as the output signal of a voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) or a local oscillator (LO). For example, the input oscillating signal may be generated by the TX frequency synthesizer 318 or the RX frequency synthesizer 330 of
The phase shifter 404 may be configured to shift the phase of the input signal 403 received from the input signal generator 402 by about 90° nominally. This quadrature shift produces a quadrature (Q) signal (labeled “QP” for quadrature positive) from the input signal 403, which is considered as the in-phase (I) signal (labeled “IP” for in-phase positive). The phase shifter 404 may be implemented with a delay line to produce the 90° phase shift. For certain aspects, the delay line may be calibrated to account for any phase error away from 90°. For other aspects, the delay line may be adjustable, such that the phase shift may be tuned within a certain range. In this case, the variable delay line may also be calibrated to achieve the desired phase shift in the phase shifter 404.
The input signal (IP) is sent to a first divide-by-2 frequency divider 406 (labeled “Div2-1”), which produces a first set of four signals (IP1, QP1, IN1, and QN1) having a frequency one half that of the input signal (fVCO/2), as shown in the timing diagram 420. The four signals in the first set have different phase differences therebetween. If the in-phase positive signal (IP1) output by the first frequency divider 406 is arbitrarily chosen as a phase reference signal 412 having a phase difference of 0°, then the first divider's quadrature positive signal (QP1) has a phase difference of 90° with respect to IP1 as depicted in the timing diagram 420. Likewise, the first divider's in-phase negative signal (IN1) has a phase difference of 180° with respect to IP1, and the first divider's quadrature negative signal (QN1) has a phase difference of 270° with respect to IP1.
The quadrature signal (QP) output by the phase shifter 404 is sent to a second divide-by-2 frequency divider 408 (labeled “Div2-2”), which produces a second set of four signals (IP2, QP2, IN2, and QN2) also having a frequency of fVCO/2. The four signals in the second set have different phase differences therebetween, as well as from the signals in the first set due to the initial phase shift by the phase shifter 404. With IP1 output by the first frequency divider 406 remaining as the phase reference signal 412, then the second frequency divider's in-phase positive signal (IP2) has a phase difference of 45° with respect to IP1. Likewise, the second divider's quadrature positive signal (QP2), in-phase negative signal (IN2), and quadrature negative signal (QN2) have respective phase differences of 135°, 225°, and 315° with respect to IP1.
For certain aspects, an amplifier 410 may be connected between the input signal generator 402 and the phase shifter 404. The amplifier 410 may be configured—with or without supporting circuitry—to buffer, amplify, or attenuate the input signal before being phase shifted by the phase shifter 404. The amplifier 410 may be single-ended or differential.
The ideas presented above can be extended to generate a greater number of multiphase signals, such as 12 or 16 multiphase signals. Generating more than 8 multiphase signals having the same frequency may be accomplished by incorporating more phase shifters with smaller phase shifts (e.g., more delay lines with finer delays) and more frequency dividers. For example,
The first divide-by-2 frequency divider 406 (labeled “Div2-1”) in
The first phase shifter 452 may be configured to shift the phase of the input signal 403 received from the input signal generator 402 by about 45° nominally to produce a first phase-shifted signal 462. The second divide-by-2 frequency divider 408 (labeled “Div2-2”) in
The second phase shifter 453 may be configured to shift the phase of the first phase-shifted signal 462 by about 45° nominally to produce a second phase-shifted signal 464. The third divide-by-2 frequency divider 456 (labeled “Div2-3”) in
The third phase shifter 454 may be configured to shift the phase of the second phase-shifted signal 464 by about 45° nominally to produce a third phase-shifted signal 466. The fourth divide-by-2 frequency divider 458 (labeled “Div2-4”) in
In
The first variable delay line 506 in
Since the first phase-shifted signal 510 output from the first variable delay line 506 may have a phase error from the desired phase shift, the delay calibration circuit 504 may be used to tune the first variable delay line 506 and adjust the amount of phase shift produced thereby. The delay calibration circuit 504 may include a second variable delay line 508, a bang-bang phase comparator 514, and a finite state machine (FSM) 516. The second variable delay line 508 may be cascaded with the first variable delay line 506 to phase shift the first phase-shifted signal 510 about 90° to produce a second phase-shifted signal 512. The second phase-shifted signal 512 has a total phase difference of 180° with respect to Vin_n, such that the second phase-shifted signal 512 is nearly in-phase with Vin_p.
In this manner, the bang-bang phase comparator 514 may be used to compare two signals (Vin_p and the second phase-shifted signal 512) having the same (or nearly the same) phase and determine which of the two signals has edges (e.g., rising edges) arriving first. As illustrated in
The FSM 516 may receive one or both of the comparison signals from the bang-bang phase comparator 514. The FSM 516 may process the comparison signal(s) and make a decision to increase, decrease, or maintain a value of a variable affecting either or both of the first and second variable delay lines 506, 508. The decision may be made using a binary search algorithm, for example, using shift registers in the FSM 516 to increase or decrease the delay. The FSM 516 may control the first and/or second variable delay lines 506, 508 via a control line 518 or through a multiplexer 520 outputting to the control line 518. The multiplexer 520 may be used to override calibration by commandeering the control line 518. For certain aspects, the FSM 516 may have two separate control lines, one for each of the first and second variable delay lines 506, 508.
The delay output (Q) of a delay (D) latch 522 may be used in an effort to synchronize reset of the S-R latch 515 with the input signal (Vine) thereto, since this input signal is used as a reference signal for delay line calibration. Without this synchronization, the reset of the S-R latch 515 may happen asynchronously with respect to the reference for delay calibration. The S-R latch 515 may respond only to the first 0→1 transition (i.e., rising edge) after the reset and keep this value until the next falling edge of the reset signal. The D latch 522 may itself be reset based on an output from the FSM 516.
Calibration may be performed in a similar manner for multiphase signal generating circuits outputting a greater number of multiphase signals than 8. For example, in the 16-phase signal generating circuit 450 of
The operations 600 may begin, at block 602, with the multiphase generating circuit frequency dividing an input signal to generate a first set of signals having a first frequency less than an input frequency of the input signal. The signals in the first set may have different phase differences therebetween.
At block 604, the multiphase generating circuit may phase shift the input signal to produce a first output signal having a first phase difference with respect to the input signal. The phase shifting at block 604 may involve using a delay line, for example, between the input signal and the first output signal. In this case, the operations 600 may further include the multiphase generating circuit adjusting the delay line, such that the first phase difference is a variable phase difference with respect to the input signal.
At block 606, the multiphase generating circuit may frequency divide the first output signal to generate a second set of signals having a second frequency less than the input frequency. The first set of signals may have four signals, and the second set of signals may also have four signals. For certain aspects, frequency dividing the input signal and/or frequency dividing the first output signal involves frequency dividing by 2 using a frequency divide-by-2 circuit, for example.
According to certain aspects, the first frequency equals the second frequency. For certain aspects, the first frequency and the second frequency are half the input frequency.
According to certain aspects, signals in the first set have phase differences of 0°, 90°, 180°, and 270° with respect to a reference signal, the reference signal being one of the first set of signals. The signals in the second set may have phase differences of 45°, 135°, 225°, and 315° with respect to the reference signal.
According to certain aspects, the input signal is a differential signal having a positive signal and a negative signal. For certain aspects, phase shifting the input signal at block 604 entails phase shifting the positive signal. For other aspects, the multiphase generating circuit may phase shift the negative signal.
According to certain aspects, the operations 600 further include the multiphase generating circuit phase shifting the first output signal to produce a second output signal having a second phase difference with respect to the first output signal at block 608. In this case, the multiphase generating circuit may also compare edges of the input signal with edges of the second output signal at block 610 and control increasing or decreasing a parameter affecting the first and/or second phase difference(s) at block 612, based on whether the edges of the input signal are earlier or later than the edges of the second output signal.
According to certain aspects, the operations 600 further involve using at least one of the first set of signals or the second set of signals as multiphase signals in an N-path filter.
According to certain aspects, the operations 600 further involve the multiphase generating circuit determining a third frequency of an oscillating signal associated with a first voltage by using at least one of the first or second set of signals; determining a fourth frequency of the oscillating signal associated with a second voltage by using the at least one of the first or second set of signals, wherein the second voltage is different than the first voltage; and calculating a gain (e.g., kVCO) based on the third frequency, the fourth frequency, the first voltage, and the second voltage. For certain aspects, determining the third frequency or the fourth frequency includes concurrently counting edges of each signal in the first and/or second set(s) of signals over a period. The oscillating signal may be the input signal.
As described above, multiphase signal generation has many useful applications, such as fast frequency measurement of the input oscillating signal output by the input signal generator 402. Such fast frequency estimation may be performed by concurrently counting edges (e.g., rising edges) of the generated multiphase signals over a known period and summing the results for all signals. For example,
Such fast frequency estimation may also be used to quickly determine a VCO gain (kVCO) with high accuracy. Since a VCO outputs signals having different frequencies based on the input voltage,
where f1 is the frequency of the signal output by the VCO when the input voltage is v1 and where f2 is the frequency of the signal output when the input voltage is v2. The two different input voltages may be input to the VCO, and the two output frequencies associated with the VCO input voltages may be measured using the fast, accurate frequency estimation based on multiphase signals described above. The VCO gain may be calculated based on the input voltages and their associated output frequencies.
Another application for multiphase signals is in N-path filters. N-path filters may also be referred to as sampled data filters or commutated capacitors.
The various operations or methods described above may be performed by any suitable means capable of performing the corresponding functions. The means may include various hardware and/or software component(s) and/or module(s), including, but not limited to a circuit, an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC), or processor. Generally, where there are operations illustrated in figures, those operations may have corresponding counterpart means-plus-function components with similar numbering.
For example, means for transmitting may comprise a transmitter (e.g., the transceiver front end 254 of the user terminal 120 depicted in
As used herein, the term “determining” encompasses a wide variety of actions. For example, “determining” may include calculating, computing, processing, deriving, investigating, looking up (e.g., looking up in a table, a database or another data structure), ascertaining and the like. Also, “determining” may include receiving (e.g., receiving information), accessing (e.g., accessing data in a memory) and the like. Also, “determining” may include resolving, selecting, choosing, establishing and the like.
As used herein, a phrase referring to “at least one of” a list of items refers to any combination of those items, including single members. As an example, “at least one of: a, b, or c” is intended to cover: a, b, c, a-b, a-c, b-c, and a-b-c.
The various illustrative logical blocks, modules and circuits described in connection with the present disclosure may be implemented or performed with a general purpose processor, a digital signal processor (DSP), an application specific integrated circuit (ASIC), a field programmable gate array (FPGA) or other programmable logic device (PLD), discrete gate or transistor logic, discrete hardware components, or any combination thereof designed to perform the functions described herein. A general-purpose processor may be a microprocessor, but in the alternative, the processor may be any commercially available processor, controller, microcontroller, or state machine. A processor may also be implemented as a combination of computing devices, e.g., a combination of a DSP and a microprocessor, a plurality of microprocessors, one or more microprocessors in conjunction with a DSP core, or any other such configuration.
The methods disclosed herein comprise one or more steps or actions for achieving the described method. The method steps and/or actions may be interchanged with one another without departing from the scope of the claims. In other words, unless a specific order of steps or actions is specified, the order and/or use of specific steps and/or actions may be modified without departing from the scope of the claims.
The functions described may be implemented in hardware, software, firmware, or any combination thereof. If implemented in hardware, an example hardware configuration may comprise a processing system in a wireless node. The processing system may be implemented with a bus architecture. The bus may include any number of interconnecting buses and bridges depending on the specific application of the processing system and the overall design constraints. The bus may link together various circuits including a processor, machine-readable media, and a bus interface. The bus interface may be used to connect a network adapter, among other things, to the processing system via the bus. The network adapter may be used to implement the signal processing functions of the PHY layer. In the case of a user terminal 120 (see
The processing system may be configured as a general-purpose processing system with one or more microprocessors providing the processor functionality and external memory providing at least a portion of the machine-readable media, all linked together with other supporting circuitry through an external bus architecture. Alternatively, the processing system may be implemented with an ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit) with the processor, the bus interface, the user interface in the case of an access terminal), supporting circuitry, and at least a portion of the machine-readable media integrated into a single chip, or with one or more FPGAs (Field Programmable Gate Arrays), PLDs (Programmable Logic Devices), controllers, state machines, gated logic, discrete hardware components, or any other suitable circuitry, or any combination of circuits that can perform the various functionality described throughout this disclosure. Those skilled in the art will recognize how best to implement the described functionality for the processing system depending on the particular application and the overall design constraints imposed on the overall system.
It is to be understood that the claims are not limited to the precise configuration and components illustrated above. Various modifications, changes and variations may be made in the arrangement, operation and details of the methods and apparatus described above without departing from the scope of the claims.