Cumulant characterizations of ADC error sources with applications to Time Interleaved ADCs

Abstract

The problem of characterizing transfer functions of Analog to Digital Converters (ADC) for use in compensation of Time Interleaved Analog to Digital Converters (TIADC) is ubiquitous in the area of mismatch correction algorithms. Identifying, classifying, and quantifying the presence of errors in ADCs and TIADCs is fundamental in the pursuit of correcting these errors. This problem, characterization of error effects, is investigated through calculation of higher order cumulants on the error signals of each type of system. The concept of cumulant calculation and interpretation is presented and applied to varying error environments and input signals.