Verifying global convergence for a digital phase-locked loop

Abstract

We present a verification of a digital phase-locked loop (PLL) using the SpaceEx hybrid-systems tool. In particular, we establish global convergence - from any initial state the PLL eventually reaches a state of phase and frequency lock. Having shown that the PLL converges to a small region, traditional methods of circuit analysis based on linear-systems theory can be used to characterize the response of the PLL when in lock. The majority of the verification involves modeling each component of the PLL with piece-wise linear differential inclusions. We show how non-linear transfer functions, quantization error, and other non-idealities can be included in such a model. A limitation of piece-wise linear inclusions is that the linear coefficients for each component must take on fixed values. For real designs, ranges will be specified for these components. We show how a key step of the verification can be generalized to handle interval values for the linear coefficients by using an SMT solver.