Enhancing the L1 Data Cache Design to Mitigate HCI

Over the lifetime of a microprocessor, the Hot Carrier Injection (HCI) phenomenon degrades the threshold voltage, which causes slower transistor switching and eventually results in timing violations and faulty operation. This effect appears when the memory cell contents flip from logic ‘0’ to ‘1’ and vice versa. In caches, the majority of cell flips are concentrated into only a few of t…