A fast transient response digital LDO with a TDC-based signal converter

Abstract

The digital low drop-out regulator (LDO) has been used widely in digital circuits for its low supply voltage characteristics. However, as the traditional digital LDOs regulate the output voltage code at a rate of 1 bit per clock cycle, the transient response speed is limited. This paper presents a digital LDO to improve transient response speed with a multi-bit conversion technique. The proposed technology uses a voltage sensor and a time-to-digital converter to convert the output voltage to digital codes. Based on a 65-nm CMOS process, the proposed DLDO reduces the settling time from 147.8 ns to 25.2 ns on average and the response speed is improved by about six times.