248pW, 0.11mV/°C glitch-free programmable voltage detector with multiple voltage duplicator for energy harvesting

Abstract

A glitch-free programmable voltage detector is proposed for RF energy harvesting. In energy harvesting applications, ultra-low power (<; 1nW), PVT-variation tolerant, and glitch-free voltage detectors are required to turn on or off the output switch which connects an output capacitor of the energy harvester and the load circuits. The proposed multiple voltage duplicator (MVD) enables the ultra-low power (248pW at 1V) feature, detection voltage programmability (<; 49-mV step), and temperature-variation tolerant (0.11mV/°C in -20°C to 80°C) operation in 250-nm CMOS. In the conventional voltage detectors, when the input voltage is increased from 0V, a glitch of the output is observed, which mistakenly turns on the output switch and spoils the energy harvesting. To remove the glitch, the glitch-free programmable voltage detector is proposed.