Enhancement of Commercial Grade VLSI Chips into Industrial Grade using a Novel Thermal Monitoring and Control Technique

Abstract

The aerospace and military applications demanding low cost, high performance, reliable computing chips at low operating temperature environment. In the proposed work a cost-effective solution has developed with novel mechanism to enhance use of commercial grade VLSI chips for industrial grade applications. Here the commercial grade FPGA worked satisfactorily beyond its lower temperature range typically up to -15°C. A thermoelectric cooler is used for temperature grade extension along with temperature sensor and TDC. A fully digital onchip temperature sensor based on delay line is implemented on FPGA. The TDC used, provides a digital equivalent of variation in delay due to change in temperature with time resolution of 213ps and temperature resolution of 0.06°C throughout the operating range.