A High-Voltage-Tolerant and Precise Charge-Balanced Neuro-Stimulator in Low Voltage CMOS Process

IEEE Trans Biomed Circuits Syst. 2016 Dec;10(6):1087-1099. doi: 10.1109/TBCAS.2015.2512443. Epub 2016 Mar 24.

Abstract

This paper presents a 4 × VDD neuro-stimulator in a 0.18- μm 1.8 V/3.3 V CMOS process. The self-adaption bias technique and stacked MOS configuration are used to prevent transistors from the electrical overstress and gate-oxide reliability issue. A high-voltage-tolerant level shifter with power-on protection is used to drive the neuro-stimulator The reliability measurement of up to 100 million periodic cycles with 3000- μA biphasic stimulations in 12-V power supply has verified that the proposed neuro-stimulator is robust. Precise charge balance is achieved by using a novel current memory cell with the dual calibration loops and leakage current compensation. The charge mismatch is down to 0.25% over all the stimulus current ranges (200-300 μA) The residual average dc current is less than 6.6 nA after shorting operation.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • Electric Stimulation
  • Electricity*
  • Electrodes, Implanted
  • Electroencephalography / instrumentation
  • Electroencephalography / methods
  • Equipment Design
  • Humans
  • Neurons / physiology*
  • Rats
  • Rats, Long-Evans
  • Semiconductors*