CROSSTALK AND NOISE

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Role of Noise
• Increased number of metal layers
• Vertically dominant metal ratio
• Higher routing density due to finer geometry
• Larger number of interacting devices and
interconnect
• Faster waveforms due to higher frequencies
• Lower supply voltage

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CROSSTALK NOISE
• Crosstalk noise refers to unintentional coupling
activity between two or more signals.
• The crosstalk noise is caused by the capacitive
coupling between neighboring signals on the die
• This results in switching activity on a net to cause
unintentional effects on the coupled signals.
• The affected signal is called victim
• the affecting signals are termed as aggressors
• two coupled nets can affect each other, and often a
net can be a victim as well as an aggressor.

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Types of Noise effect
• There are two types of noise effects caused by
crosstalk
• Glitch, which refers to noise caused on a steady
victim signal due to coupling of switching activity of
neighboring aggressors
• change in timing (crosstalk delta delay), caused by
coupling of switching activity of the victim with the
switching activity of the aggressors

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Crosstalk Glitch Analysis
• A steady signal net can have a glitch due to charge
transferred by the switching aggressors through the
coupling capacitances

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• In this example, the NAND2 cell UNAND0 switches
and charges its output net
• Some of the charge is also transferred to the victim
net through the coupling capacitance Cc and results
in the positive glitch
• The amount of charge transferred is directly related
to the coupling capacitance, Cc, between the
aggressor and the victim net

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• The magnitude of the glitch caused is dependent
upon a variety of factors. Some ofthesefactorsare:
• Coupling capacitance between the aggressor net
and victim
• Slew of the aggressor net
• Victim net grounded capacitance
• Victim net driving strength

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Types of Glitches
• Rise and Fall Glitches
• Overshoot and Undershoot Glitches

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Glitch Thresholds and Propagation
• A glitch caused by coupling from a switching
aggressor can propagate through the fanout cell
• Analysis based upon DC or AC noise thresholds,
determine whether a glitch at a net can be
propagated through the fanout cells
• The DC noise analysis only examines the glitch
magnitude
• AC noise analysis examines other attributes such as
glitch width and fanout cell output load

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DC Thresholds
• The DC noise margin is a check used for glitch
magnitude and refers to the DC noise limits on the
input of a cell while ensuring proper logic
functionality

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AC analysis
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