Date: 27/09/2008

ST Engineer's book on Domino Logic

ST Microelectronics' engineers have revealed how to use domino logic; a very fast logic circuit design style used in the high performance custom designs, in an automated framework. The book "High Performance ASIC Design: Using Synthesizable Domino Logic in An ASIC Flow" written by Razak Hossain, a Senior Principal Engineer working at ST Microelectronics describes in detail the methodology for using domino logic in a standard automated design flow.

Domino Logic techniques allow digital designs to be completed in less time and with fewer designers than custom design techniques.

Domino logics speed up circuits, take less physical space, and reduce parasitic capacitance. If a legacy design needs to be made to run faster, it can be done with domino logic without incurring the cost of re-designing the micro-architecture and porting the software. Another application of high-speed digital logic is in scaled CMOS mixed signal applications where it can be used to control analog and radio frequency (RF) circuitry. The judicious use of domino logic in critical blocks minimizes the power overhead in its use, while maximizing the performance of any process technology.

"High speed digital logic is critically important for radio frequency (RF) application designed in advanced CMOS processes as this part of the wireless modem is increasingly relying on digital signal processing," said Thierry Arnaud, Director of RF Design at ST-NXP Wireless. "Automated design techniques provides for improved productivity, time to market, and overall design quality."
The book titled "High Performance ASIC Design: Using Synthesizable Domino Logic in An ASIC Flow, published by Cambridge University Press, starts with an overview of design techniques to achieve high speed in ASIC designs.
The design and characterization of domino logic standard cell libraries and an advanced domino logic synthesis flow are described in detail.
Actual results achieved by using automated domino logic design techniques, including silicon measurements, are presented to validate the methodology, whilst real-world design examples, such as the implementation of the execution unit of a microprocessor and Viterbi decoder, show how the techniques are applied in practice.
This book is ideal for graduate students and researchers in electrical and computer engineering, and also for circuit designers and EDA engineers in industry.