Dual Use of Power Lines for Data Communications in a System-On-Chip Environment

Abstract

We propose to use power pins to carry data signals while simultaneously delivering power. A direct superposition of a data signal on a power pin would fail due to the inherent high noise level on power lines and this precludes the possibility for multiple data channels. To address the problem, we suggest adoption of the UWB (ultra wideband) and direct sequence-code division multiple access (DS-CDMA) communication technologies. Because of the wide bandwidth, a UWB signal can reduce its average power level practically to the noise level. DS-CDMA further mitigates the noise and allows multiple data channels to share interconnected power lines. We studied the feasibility of the proposed scheme through SPICE simulations and present the simulation results.