Chip-integrated power management solutions are a must for ultra-low power systems. This enables not only the optimization of innovative sensor applications. It is also essential for integration and miniaturization of energy harvesting supply strategies of portable and autonomous monitoring systems. The book particularly addresses interfaces for energy harvesting, which are the key element to connect micro transducers to energy storage elements. Main features of the book are: - A comprehensive technology and application review, basics on transducer mechanics, fundamental circuit and control design, prototyping and testing, up to sensor system supply and applications. - Novel interfacing concepts - including active rectifiers, MPPT methods for efficient tracking of DC as well as AC sources, and a fully-integrated charge pump for efficient maximum AC power tracking at sub-100μW ultra-low power levels. The chips achieve one of widest presented operational voltage range in standard CMOS technology: 0.44V to over 4.1V. - Two special chapters on analog circuit design – it studies benefits and obstacles on implemented chip prototypes with three goals: ultra- low power, wide supply voltage range, and integration with standard technologies. Alternative design approaches are pursued using bulk-input transistor stages in forward-bias operation for amplifiers, modulators, and references. - Comprehensive Appendix – with additional fundamental analysis, design and scaling guidelines, circuit implementation tables and dimensions, schematics, source code listings, bill of material, etc. The discussed prototypes and given design guidelines are tested with real vibration transducer devices. The intended readership is graduate students in advanced courses, academics and lecturers, R&D engineers.

Electromagnetic vibration transducers are seen as an effective way of harvesting ambient energy for the supply of sensor monitoring systems. Different electromagnetic coupling architectures have been employed but no comprehensive comparison with respect to their output performance has been carried out up to now. Electromagnetic Vibration Energy Harvesting Devices introduces an optimization approach which is applied to determine optimal dimensions of the components (magnet, coil and back iron). Eight different commonly applied coupling architectures are investigated. The results show that correct dimensions are of great significance for maximizing the efficiency of the energy conversion. A comparison yields the architectures with the best output performance capability which should be preferably employed in applications. A prototype development is used to demonstrate how the optimization calculations can be integrated into the design–flow. Electromagnetic Vibration Energy Harvesting Devices targets the designer of electromagnetic vibration transducers who wishes to have a greater in-depth understanding for maximizing the output performance.

This book deals with the challenge of exploiting ambient vibrational energy which can be used to power small and low-power electronic devices, e.g. wireless sensor nodes. Generally, particularly for low voltage amplitudes, low-loss rectification is required to achieve high conversion efficiency. In the special case of piezoelectric energy harvesting, pulsed charge extraction has the potential to extract more power compared to a single rectifier. For this purpose, a fully autonomous CMOS integrated interface circuit for piezoelectric generators which fulfills these requirements is presented. Due to these key properties enabling universal usage, other CMOS designers working in the field of energy harvesting will be encouraged to use some of the shown structures for their own implementations. The book is unique in the sense that it highlights the design process from scratch to the final chip. Hence, it gives the designer a comprehensive guide of how to (i) setup an appropriate harvester model to get realistic simulation results, (ii) design the integrated circuits for low power operation, (iii) setup a laboratory measurement environment in order to extensively characterize the chip in combination with the real harvester and finally, (iv) interpret the simulation/measurement results in order to improve the chip performance. Since the dimensions of all devices (transistors, resistors etc.) are given, readers and other designers can easily re-use the presented circuit concepts.

The release of this second volume of CHIPS 2020 coincides with the 50th anniversary of Moore’s Law, a critical year marked by the end of the nanometer roadmap and by a significantly reduced annual rise in chip performance. At the same time, we are witnessing a data explosion in the Internet, which is consuming 40% more electrical power every year, leading to fears of a major blackout of the Internet by 2020. The messages of the first CHIPS 2020, published in 2012, concerned the realization of quantum steps for improving the energy efficiency of all chip functions. With this second volume, we review these messages and amplify upon the most promising directions: ultra-low-voltage electronics, nanoscale monolithic 3D integration, relevant-data, brain- and human-vision-inspired processing, and energy harvesting for chip autonomy. The team of authors, enlarged by more world leaders in low-power, monolithic 3D, video, and Silicon brains, presents new vistas in nanoelectronics, promising Moore-like exponential growth sustainable through to the 2030s.

A CMOS Self-Powered Front-End Architecture for Subcutaneous Event-Detector Devices presents the conception and prototype realization of a Self-Powered architecture for subcutaneous detector devices. The architecture is designed to work as a true/false (event detector) or threshold level alarm of some substances, ions, etc... that are detected through a three-electrodes amperometric BioSensor approach. The device is envisaged as a Low-Power subcutaneous implantable application powered by an inductive link, one emitter antenna at the external side of the skin and the receiver antenna under the skin. The sensor is controlled with a Potentiostat circuit and then, a post-processing unit detects the desired levels and activates the transmission via a backscattering method by the inductive link. All the instrumentation, except the power module, is implemented in the so called BioChip. Following the idea of the powering link to harvest energy of the magnetic induced link at the implanted device, a Multi-Harvesting Power Chip (MHPC) has been also designed.

This book discusses in detail the CMOS implementation of energy harvesting. The authors describe an integrated, indoor light energy harvesting system, based on a controller circuit that dynamically and automatically adjusts its operation to meet the actual light circumstances of the environment where the system is placed. The system is intended to power a sensor node, enabling an autonomous wireless sensor network (WSN). Although designed to cope with indoor light levels, the system is also able to work with higher levels, making it an all-round light energy harvesting system. The discussion includes experimental data obtained from an integrated manufactured prototype, which in conjunction with a photovoltaic (PV) cell, serves as a proof of concept of the desired energy harvesting system.

With contributions from an internationally-renowned group of experts, this book uses a multidisciplinary approach to review recent developments in the field of smart sensor systems, covering important system and design aspects. It examines topics over the whole range of sensor technology from the theory and constraints of basic elements, physics and electronics, up to the level of application-orientated issues. Developed as a complementary volume to ‘Smart Sensor Systems’ (Wiley 2008), which introduces the basics of smart sensor systems, this volume focuses on emerging sensing technologies and applications, including: State-of-the-art techniques for designing smart sensors and smart sensor systems, including measurement techniques at system level, such as dynamic error correction, calibration, self-calibration and trimming. Circuit design for sensor systems, such as the design of precision instrumentation amplifiers. Impedance sensors, and the associated measurement techniques and electronics, that measure electrical characteristics to derive physical and biomedical parameters, such as blood viscosity or growth of micro-organisms. Complete sensor systems-on-a-chip, such as CMOS optical imagers and microarrays for DNA detection, and the associated circuit and micro-fabrication techniques. Vibratory gyroscopes and the associated electronics, employing mechanical and electrical signal amplification to enable low-power angular-rate sensing. Implantable smart sensors for neural interfacing in bio-medical applications. Smart combinations of energy harvesters and energy-storage devices for autonomous wireless sensors. Smart Sensor Systems: Emerging Technologies and Applications will greatly benefit final-year undergraduate and postgraduate students in the areas of electrical, mechanical and chemical engineering, and physics. Professional engineers and researchers in the microelectronics industry, including microsystem developers, will also find this a thorough and useful volume.

The Conference is the premier international meeting for the presentation of original work addressing all aspects of the theory, design, fabrication, assembly, packaging, testing and application of solid-state sensors, actuators, MEMS, and microsystems.

This book describes the design of microelectronic circuits for energy harvesting, broadband energy conversion, new methods and technologies for energy conversion. The author also discusses the design of power management circuits and the implementation of voltage regulators. Coverage includes advanced methods in low and high power electronics, as well as principles of micro-scale design based on piezoelectric, electromagnetic and thermoelectric technologies with control and conditioning circuit design.

Signal Processing is one of the large specializations in electrical engineering, mechanical engineering and computer sciences. It derives input from physics, mathematics and is an indispensable feature of all natural- and life sciences in research and in application. The snew series "Advanced Issues on Signals, Systems and Devices" presents original publications mainly from speakers on the International Conferences on Signal Systems and Devices but also from other international authors. The Conference is a forum for researchers and specialists in different fields covering all types of sensors and measurement systems as for example: Biomedical and Environmental Measurements & Instrumentation; Optical, Chemical and Biomedical Sensors; Mechanical and Thermal Sensors; Micro-Sensors and MEMS-Technology; Nano Sensors, Nano Systems and Nano Technology; Spectroscopy Methods; Signal Processing and Modelling; Multi Sensor Data Fusion; Data Acquisition & Distributed Measurements; Medical and Environmental Applications; Circuit Test, Device Characterization and Modelling; Custom and Semi-Custom Circuits; Analog Circuit Design; Low-Voltage, Low-Power VLSI Design; Hardware Implementation; Materials, Devices and Interconnects; Packaging and Reliability; Battery Monitoring: Impedance Spectroscopy for Measurement and Sensor Solutions; Energy Harvesting and Wireless power Transfer Systems; Wireless Sensor Networks in Industrial Plants This first volume of the new series mainly devotes to the most recent research and implementation of sensors-, circuit systems in signal processing, energy harvesting, nano- and molecular electronics.