Design of Low Power & Low Noise On-Chip BioAmplifier in Cooperation with Analog IC Synthesis at 130nm Skywater Technology

Abstract

Biomedical applications require sensor interface circuits to process considerably low level signals in amplitude and predispose them for digital signal processing (DSP). One of the building blocks of a sensor interface is the bioamplifier, where the signals acquired from the body (EMG, ECG, ENG etc.) are first conditioned under certain constraints such as low noise, high gain, etc. Considering all these constraints and challenging trade-offs among them, design of the bioamplifier may become very complicated to be performed manually. In this paper, we present a low noise and low power bioamplifier, which has been designed with the aid of an analog circuit synthesis tool. To this end, all sub-blocks of the bioamplifier have been optimized via a multi-objective analog optimization tool, then these sub-blocks have been assembled to achieve the final design. All designs have been realized using 130nm Skywater technology parameters. Post-layout simulations have indicated that the design has an input referred noise of 12.8 μV rms, 0.017 mm2 chip area, and 7.25 μW power consumption. Also, Monte Carlo analysis has showed that the circuit can operate properly even under the process variations.