Small-Area Radiofrequency-Energy-Harvesting Integrated Circuits for Powering Wireless Sensor Networks

Sensors

Chao-Kong Chung¹  Guo-Ming Sung¹  Yu-Jen Lai¹  Jin-Yu Syu¹ 

[1] Department of Electrical Engineering, National Taipei University of Technology, Taipei 10608, Taiwan;

关键词: radiofrequency;    ISM 915 MHz;    energy-harvesting IC;    native MOS;    Dickson voltage multiplier;    over-voltage protection circuit;    low-dropout regulator;    charger control circuit;   

DOI  :  10.3390/s19081754

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

This study presents a radiofrequency (RF)-energy-harvesting integrated circuit (IC) for powering wireless sensor networks with a wireless transmitter with an industrial, scientific, and medical (ISM) of 915 MHz. The proposed IC comprises an RF-direct current (DC) rectifier, an over-voltage protection circuit, a low-power low-dropout (LDO) voltage regulator, and a charger control circuit. In the RF-DC rectifier circuit, a six-stage Dickson voltage multiplier circuit is used to improve the received RF signal to a DC voltage by using native MOS with a small threshold voltage. The over-voltage protection circuit is used to prevent a high-voltage breakdown phenomenon from the RF front-end circuit, particularly for near-field communication. A low-power LDO regulator is designed to provide stable voltage by using zero frequency compensation and a voltage-trimming feedback. Charging current is amplified N times by using a current mirror to rapidly and stably charge a battery in the proposed charger control circuit. The obtained results revealed that the maximum power conversion efficiency of the proposed RF-energy-harvesting IC was 40.56% at an input power of −6 dBm, an output voltage of 1.5 V, and a load of 30 kΩ. A chip area of the RF-energy-harvesting IC was 0.58 × 0.49 mm², including input/output pads, and power consumption was 42 μW.

【 授权许可】

Unknown