Abstract:
A method for detecting displacements of a micro-electromechanical sensor (101) including a fixed body (3) and a mobile mass (4), forming at least a first sensing capacitor (107) and a second sensing capacitor (108), which are connected to a first input terminal (102) and, respectively, to a first output terminal (104) and to a second output terminal (105) of the sensing circuit and have a rest common sensing capacitance (Cs). The method includes the steps of: closing a first negative-feedback loop (136), which comprises the first sensing capacitor (107) and the second sensing capacitor (108) and a differential amplifier (124); supplying to at least one input (124b) of the differential amplifier (124) a staircase sensing voltage (Vs) through driving capacitors (121, 122) so as to produce variations (ΔVc) of an electrical driving quantity (Vc) which are inversely proportional to the common sensing capacitance (Cs); and driving the sensor (101) with the electrical driving quantity (Vc) .
Abstract:
A method of improving the signal/noise ratio of a sigma-delta modulator during the re-establishment of its stability which comprises the following steps: defining a bit sequence corresponding to a state of instability of the modulator, monitoring the flow of bits output by the modulator to check whether it contains the instability bit sequence, and resetting the modulator to zero if the instability bit sequence is detected at the output. To ensure a high signal/noise ratio of the modulator even during the detection and re-establishment of stability, the method also comprises the following steps: delaying the flow of bits output by the modulator at least for the time required to detect the instability bit sequence and modifying the output bit sequence during the delay period by replacing it with a predetermined bit sequence.
Abstract:
The present invention refers to a completely differential operational amplifier of the folded cascode type. In one embodiment the completely differential operational amplifier of the folded cascode type comprises: a differential output stage (15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20 21, 22); a differential input stage (11, 12) able to drive said output stage (15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20 21, 22); said differential output stage (15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20 21, 22) includes a first branch (15, 16, 17, 18) having at least a first (16) and a second (17) transistor, and a second branch (19, 20 21, 22) having at least a third (20) and a fourth (21) transistor; said first (15, 16, 17, 18) and second (19, 20 21, 22) branch are coupled to a first (VDD) and to a second (GND) feeding voltage; a feedback circuit (40) of said first (16), second (17), third (20) and fourth (21) transistors; characterized in that said feedback circuit (40) is constituted by a single amplifier (40) having four inputs (IN1, IN2, IN3, IN4) and four outputs (OUT1, OUT2, OUTS, OUT4), said four inputs (IN1, IN2, IN3, IN4) take the voltage present on a terminal (23, 13, 24, 14) of said first (16), second (17), third (20) and fourth (21) transistors, and said four outputs (OUT1, OUT2, OUT3, OUT4) provide each a voltage to the control elements of said first (16), second (17), third (20) and fourth (21) transistors, which depend on the value of the input voltage of said four inputs (IN1, IN2, IN3, IN4).