Design Lab-Based Learning of Analog Front-End Circuits: A Sigma-Delta Modulator Lab

This paper details a Lab exercise that combines electrical and behavioral models to design ∑ΔMs. This Lab is suitable for students following an undergraduate course dealing with the design of analog-to-digital converters. Throughout the lab activities, students use different tools and modeling levels for the objects, similar to what they do in the profession. Data converter architectures employ high-level Simulink models to capture the nominal function and the thermal noise error. Active building blocks such as opamps and comparators employ electrical level and Spice simulations. Students are confronted with realistic active circuits and follow a guided methodology with a top-down complexity increase across the lab activities. Lab activities end by simulating mixed-signal circuits at the electrical level, which are complex and involve a large variety of building blocks (opamps, comparators, resistor string DACs, logic blocks, etc.). Tools employed are available at most universities, and the models are conceptually similar to those used in the profession.