TY - JOUR
T1 - A self-powered analog sensor-data-logging device based on Fowler-Nordheim dynamical systems
AU - Mehta, Darshit
AU - Aono, Kenji
AU - Chakrabartty, Shantanu
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported in part by NIH research grants 1R21EY028362-01 and 1R21AR075242-01. The authors acknowledge the help and resources provided by Prof. Srikanth Singamaneni and Prashant Gupta in acquiring micrographs of the fabricated chips. We thank Dr. Liang Zhou for useful discussions regarding quantum tunneling dynamics and circuit design. Owen Pochettino is acknowledged for helping build a chip testing station.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020, The Author(s).
PY - 2020/12/1
Y1 - 2020/12/1
N2 - Continuous, battery-free operation of sensor nodes requires ultra-low-power sensing and data-logging techniques. Here we report that by directly coupling a sensor/transducer signal into globally asymptotically stable monotonic dynamical systems based on Fowler-Nordheim quantum tunneling, one can achieve self-powered sensing at an energy budget that is currently unachievable using conventional energy harvesting methods. The proposed device uses a differential architecture to compensate for environmental variations and the device can retain sensed information for durations ranging from hours to days. With a theoretical operating energy budget less than 10 attojoules, we demonstrate that when integrated with a miniature piezoelectric transducer the proposed sensor-data-logger can measure cumulative “action” due to ambient mechanical acceleration without any additional external power.
AB - Continuous, battery-free operation of sensor nodes requires ultra-low-power sensing and data-logging techniques. Here we report that by directly coupling a sensor/transducer signal into globally asymptotically stable monotonic dynamical systems based on Fowler-Nordheim quantum tunneling, one can achieve self-powered sensing at an energy budget that is currently unachievable using conventional energy harvesting methods. The proposed device uses a differential architecture to compensate for environmental variations and the device can retain sensed information for durations ranging from hours to days. With a theoretical operating energy budget less than 10 attojoules, we demonstrate that when integrated with a miniature piezoelectric transducer the proposed sensor-data-logger can measure cumulative “action” due to ambient mechanical acceleration without any additional external power.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85094201303&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1038/s41467-020-19292-w
DO - 10.1038/s41467-020-19292-w
M3 - Article
C2 - 33116118
AN - SCOPUS:85094201303
SN - 2041-1723
VL - 11
JO - Nature communications
JF - Nature communications
IS - 1
M1 - 5446
ER -