Integration of asynchronous and self-checking multiple-valued current-mode circuits based on dual-rail differential logic

A new multiple-valued current-mode (MVCM) integrated circuit based on dual-rail differential logic, whose current-driving capability is high at a low supply voltage, is proposed to realize a totally self-checking circuit and an asynchronous-control circuit. Two nMOS transistors with different threshold voltages are used as complementary pass switches in the proposed differential-pair circuit (DPC), so that the outputs of the DPC always become stable even when non-code-word input (1, 1) are applied, which makes it possible to design a self-checking circuit by using the MVCM circuit. In addition, the dual-rail MVCM circuit technique can be naturally utilized for efficient realization of a two-color dual-rail data-transfer scheme in asynchronous communication. In fact, it is demonstrated that the performance of both a self-checking multiplier and a simple asynchronous control circuit is superior to that of the corresponding ordinary implementation.