A near-threshold, 0.16 nJ/b OOK-transmitter with 0.18 nJ/b noise-cancelling super-regenerative receiver for the medical implant communications service.
A 0.16 nJ/b MICS transmitter and 0.18 nJ/b super-regenerative receiver are demonstrated, where each is specifically designed to operate in the near-threshold region. The low-VDD transmitter utilizes a sub-harmonic injection-locked ring oscillator, edge combiner for frequency multiplication, and class-C power amplifier. The low-VDD receiver introduces a replica super-regenerative receiver as a method to reject common-mode noise sources, such as supply/substrate coupling, thereby reducing undesired self-oscillations and improving BER. Designed in a 90-nm CMOS process, the test-chip measurements show a sensitivity of -80 dBm at 500 kb/s and -65 dBm at 1 Mb/s, respectively, at a BER less than 10⁻³, with 340 μW total power.
Chao
C
Ma
Changhui
C
Hu
Jiao
J
Cheng
Lingli
L
Xia
Patrick Yin
PY
Chiang
D004582:Electronics, Medical / Q000295:instrumentation*; D004867:Equipment Design; D058998:Remote Sensing Technology / Q000295:instrumentation*; D012666:Semiconductors