Self-adaptive power gating with test circuit for on-line characterization of energy inflection activity

Abstract

A test circuit is presented for post-silicon and on-line characterization of the energy-inflection activity of power-gated circuits (the activity when overhead energy is equal to leakage savings) under static (process) and dynamic (voltage/temperature/input) variations. The test circuit is applied to design self-adaptive power-gating for energy-efficient SRAM.