An Antenna Co-Design Dual Band RF Energy Harvester

作者：Li Bo^*; Shao Xi; Shahshahan Negin; Goldsman Neil; Salter Thomas; Metze George M

来源：IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CIRCUITS AND SYSTEMS I-REGULAR PAPERS, 2013, 60(12): 3256-3266.

DOI：10.1109/TCSI.2013.2264712

• CMOS voltage doubler
• low power energy solution
• low power RF harvester
• voltage boosting techniques

RF energy is widely available in urban areas and thus presents a promising ambient energy harvesting source. In this paper, a CMOS harvester circuit is modeled and analyzed in detail at low environmental power levels. Based on the circuit analysis, a design procedure is given for a narrowband energy harvester. The antenna and harvester co-design methodology is discussed to improve RF to DC energy conversion efficiency. We demonstrate that it is difficult to harvest RF energy over a wide frequency band if the ambient RF energy sources are weak, owing to the voltage requirements. Since most ambient RF energy lies in a few narrow bands, a dual/multi-band energy harvester architecture should be able to harvest much of the available RF energy. A dual-band CMOS energy harvester is designed and fabricated using an IBM 0.13 m process. The simulated and measured results demonstrate a dual-band energy harvester that obtains over 9% efficiency for two different bands (around 900 MHz and around 1900 MHz) at an input power as low as -19.3 dBm. The DC output voltage of this harvester is over 1 V, which can be used to recharge the battery to form an inexhaustibly powered communication system.

• 出版日期2013-12