Patent ID: 9030790
Filing Date: 2015-05-12
Classification: H02H

Abstract:
1. An electrostatic discharge (ESD) protection circuit comprising: an input operative to receive input signals; and a primary protection circuit coupled to the input, wherein the protection circuit is operative to provide a single ESD current path for one or more the input signals that are ESD strikes, wherein the primary protection circuit includes at least one transistor on the single ESD current path, wherein the primary protection circuit produces a leakage current at the input and uses at least one bootstrapping amplifier to provide a reduced voltage across the transistor and to reduce input current dependency of the leakage current on an input voltage at the input, wherein the currents of positive ESD strikes and negative ESD strikes flow through the single ESD current path, and wherein the single ESD current path is not used by one or more of the input signals that are non-ESD signals.