Design Considerations for Low-Power Single-Electron Transistor Logic Circuits

We have investigated design considerations for low-power single-electron transistor (SET) logic circuits. Supply-voltage scaling is introduced as a method for reducing the power consumption of SET circuits. A detailed analysis of the effects of supply-voltage scaling is given on the basis of the behavior of a complementary capacitively coupled SET inverter circuit. It has been shown that the hysteresis caused by the supply-voltage-dependent threshold voltage of a SET quickly disappears as the temperature rises, and does not ruin the desired inverting operation at a practical operation temperature. Also shown is the considerable impact of the supply-voltage scaling on reducing the power expended by leakage and short-circuit. From the results of power-delay product and delay time, it has been shown that the supply-voltage scaling should be carried out within 20% of maximum supply-voltage to maintain overall circuit performance.