Texas Instruments Assigned Patent

Texas Instruments, Inc., Dallas, has been assigned a patent (8,462,542) developed by Xiaowei Deng, Plano, TX, for a “bit-by-bit write assist for solid-state memory.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A solid-state memory in which write assist circuitry is implemented within each memory cell. Each memory cell includes a storage element, such as a pair of cross-coupled inverters, that is connected in series with a pair of power switch transistors between a power supply node and ground. One of the power switch transistors is gated by a word line indicating selection of the row containing the cell, and the other is gated by a column select signal indicating selection of the column containing the cell in a write cycle. Upon a write to the cell, both power switch transistors are turned off, removing bias from the inverter that assists its change of state in a write operation. In other embodiments, a single power switch transistor gated by either a word line or a column select signal may be used.”

The patent application was filed on June 24, 2010 (12/822,706).