A 128-Channel 0.2-8.2 V Calibrated DAC IC Achieving 0.26-LSB DNL and 0.71-LSB DVO for Photonic Computing.

Photonic computing systems require large numbers of accurate programmable voltages for photonic weight programming and device bias control. This paper presents a 128-channel digital-to-analog converter (DAC) implemented in a 250 nm BCD high-voltage CMOS process. A code-dependent per-channel auxiliary-DAC calibration scheme is proposed to compensate main-DAC conversion errors and channel-dependent offsets. In addition, a separated low-/high-voltage-domain driver and a stepwise multichannel update scheme are adopted to reduce static power and suppress update-induced disturbances. After calibration, the measured maximum absolute differential non-linearity (DNL) and integral non-linearity (INL) are 0.26 least significant bit (LSB) and 0.39 LSB, respectively, and the maximum deviation of voltage output (DVO) across 128 channels is 0.71 LSB. The DAC achieves rising/falling slew rates of 6.1/11.7 V/μs under an 8 V output swing. Under dynamic operation with 0.2 to 8.2 V sinusoidal outputs and a 10 kΩ load per channel, the total power consumption is 0.85 W. Thermo-optic phase-shifter measurements further verify programmable photonic phase tuning, demonstrating a scalable electrical control interface for thermo-optic phase-shifter-based photonic computing hardware.