A 3.2-Gb/s serial link transmitter in 0.18μm CMOS technology for CMOS Monolithic Active Pixel Sensors application

We present a 3.2-Gb/s serial link transmitter for MAPS application in future subatomic physics experiments. The transmitter features the inclusion of Reed–Solomon codes to achieve low transmission error rate. A CML driver with pre-emphasis in the transmitter allows serial transmission over low mass cables. The critical digital circuits are triplicated to resist SEU. The transmitter is fabricated in a 0.18μm CMOS Technology. A power consumption of 135 mW was measured at a typical setting. A frame data rate of 3⋅10−12 with confidence level of 94.5% was obtained through a FPGA based receiver, corresponding to a payload BER of 1.2⋅10−14 with confidence level of 94.9%. The transmitter functions well after being irradiated with 4.5 Mrad TID.