Synthesis of high-performance analog circuits in ASTRX/OBLX

We present a new synthesis strategy that can automate fully the path from an analog circuit topology and performance specifications to a sized circuit schematic. This strategy relies on asymptotic waveform evaluation to predict circuit performance and simulated annealing to solve a novel unconstrained optimization formulation of the circuit synthesis problem. We have implemented this strategy in a pair of tools called ASTRX and OBLX. To show the generality of our new approach, we have used this system to resynthesize essentially all the analog synthesis benchmarks published in the past decade; ASTWOBLX has resynthesized circuits in an afternoon that, for some prior approaches, had required months. To show the viability of the approach on difficult circuits, we have resynthesized a recently published (and patented), high-performance operational amplifier; ASTWOBLX achieved performance comparable to the expert manual design. And finally, to test the limits of the approach on industrial-sized problems, we have synthesized the component cells of a pipelined A/D converter; ASTWOBLX successfully generated cells 2-3 x more complex than those published previously.