PANINI: A Three-Stage Balanced Ternary Processor Microarchitecture for T3ISA

Overview

A balanced ternary processor microarchitecture featuring a novel 3-FET cyclic SRAM cell with three stable states (not a bi-stable latch), modulo-3 clock generation for three-phase pipeline operation, and a three-stage pipeline. The PANINI processor executes T3ISA instructions defined by P4.

The 3-FET cyclic SRAM cell is identified as the highest commercial value claim in the portfolio. Unlike conventional binary SRAM which uses 6 transistors for two stable states, this cell achieves three stable states with only three transistors — a fundamental advance in memory density for ternary computing.

Key Claims

The patent protects the following architectural innovations:

• A 3-FET cyclic SRAM cell achieving three stable states in a single memory element
• A modulo-3 clock generator producing three-phase timing signals for ternary pipeline operation
• A three-stage processor pipeline operating on balanced ternary instructions
• Cross-coupled nodes (N1, N2) providing tristable memory without bi-stable latching
• A processor microarchitecture executing the T3ISA instruction set

Layer in the Stack

Microarchitecture. The PANINI processor sits between the gate library (P6) and the system software layer (P5, P8). It is composed from P6 standard cells and executes T3ISA instructions defined by P4.

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