The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
May. 02, 2006
Filed:
Sep. 17, 2004
Applicant:
Bradley J. Garni, Austin, TX (US);
Inventor:
Bradley J. Garni, Austin, TX (US);
Assignee:
Freescale Semiconductor, Inc., Austin, TX (US);
Attorney:
Primary Examiner:
Int. Cl.
CPC ...
G11C 7/00 (2006.01);
U.S. Cl.
CPC ...
Abstract
A sense amplifier () and method for sensing a MRAM cell () is provided. The sense amplifier () includes a precharge circuit (') having an operational amplifier () that uses a voltage divider () in a feedback path to control the amount of charge stored on a capacitor (). During a precharge portion of a read operation, the charge stored on the capacitor () is used to precharge the sense amplifier (). By using charge sharing to precharge the sense amplifier (), the sense amplifier () can be precharged to a steady state common mode voltage more quickly, thus decreasing time required for a read operation.