Systems and methods for on-die heat generation and temperature sensing

1. A thermal management system, comprising:

an integrated circuit (IC) including:

a plurality of sectors, each sector including:

an on-die sensing element including:

an on-die temperature sensor configured to measure a sector temperature and provide an analog signal associated with the sector temperature; and

an on-die digitizer configured to generate a digital sensed temperature signal based on the analog signal; and

a first output configured to output a plurality of digital sensed temperature signals from the plurality of sectors.

2. The thermal management system of claim 1 , wherein the plurality of sectors are uniformly distributed in the IC.

3. The thermal management system of claim 1 , wherein the plurality of sectors are arranged in an array.

4. The thermal management system of claim 1 , wherein each sector includes:

an on-die heating element configured to generate heat based on a digital heating element control signal.

5. The thermal management system of claim 4 , wherein a first on-die heating element of a first sector includes an active heating element, and

wherein a second on-die heating element of a second sector includes a passive heating element.

6. The thermal management system of claim 4 , further comprising:

a cooling system evaluator unit configured to:

generate an initial pre-determined local temperature pattern using the on-die heating elements;

after applying a cooling solution to the IC, determine a temperature profile of the IC based on the digital sensed temperature signals; and

evaluate an efficiency of the cooling solution based on the initial pre-determined local temperature pattern and the temperature profile.

7. The thermal management system of claim 4 , further comprising:

a heating element controller configured to provide a plurality of digital heating element control signals for controlling a plurality of on-die heating elements in the plurality of sectors; and

a sensing element controller configured to read the plurality of digital sensed temperature signals from a plurality of on-die sensing elements in the plurality of sectors.

8. The thermal management system of claim 7 ,

wherein the heating element controller uses a first clock signal; and

wherein the sensing element controller uses a second clock signal different from the first clock signal.

9. The thermal management system of claim 4 , further comprising:

a dynamic on-die local temperature regulator unit configured to:

receive an optimal local temperature associated with a circuit area of the IC;

determine a first plurality of sectors within the circuit area; and

control on-die heating elements of the first plurality of sectors based on the optimal local temperature.

10. The thermal management system of claim 1 , further comprising:

a dynamic temperature profile monitor unit configured to:

receive, from the first output of the IC, the plurality of digital sensed temperature signals;

determine a first die location based on the digital sensed temperature signals and a predetermined temperature threshold; and

perform a mitigation action to reduce a die temperature at the first die location.

11. A method, comprising:

providing an integrated circuit (IC) including a plurality of sectors, wherein each sector includes an on-die sensing element;

providing, by an on-die temperature sensor of a first on-die sensing element in a first sector, an analog signal associated with a sector temperature of the first sector;

generating, by an on-die digitizer of the first on-die sensing element, a digital sensed temperature signal based on the analog signal; and

outputting, using a first output of the IC, the digital sensed temperature signal.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein the plurality of sectors are uniformly distributed in the IC.

13. The method of claim 11 , wherein the plurality of sectors are arranged in an array.

14. The method of claim 11 , wherein each sector includes an on-die heating element, further comprising:

controlling a first on-die heating element for heat generation based on a digital heating element control signal.

15. The method of claim 14 , further comprising:

receiving, using a first input of the IC, the digital heating element control signal.

16. The method of claim 14 , wherein the first on-die heating element is an active heating element.

17. The method of claim 14 , further comprising:

providing, by a heating element controller to the IC, a plurality of digital heating element control signals for controlling on-die heating elements in the plurality of sectors; and

reading, by a sensing element controller from the IC, the digital sensed temperature signals from on-die sensing elements in the plurality of sectors.

18. The method of claim 17 ,

wherein the heating element controller uses a first clock signal; and

wherein the sensing element controller uses a second clock signal different from the first clock signal.

19. The method of claim 14 , further comprising:

receiving an optimal local temperature associated with a circuit area of the IC;

determining a first plurality of sectors within the circuit area; and

controlling on-die heating elements in the first plurality of sectors based on the optimal local temperature.

20. The method of claim 11 , further comprising:

receiving, through the first output of the IC, the plurality of digital sensed temperature signals;

determining a first die location based on the digital sensed temperature signals and a predetermined temperature threshold; and

performing a mitigation action to reduce a die temperature at the first die location.