Low start-up voltage dc–dc converter with negative voltage control for thermoelectric energy harvesting

Abstract

This Letter presents a low start-up voltage dc–dc converter for low-power thermoelectric systems which uses a native n-type MOS transistor as the start-up switch. The start-up voltage of the proposed converter is 300 mV and the converter does not need batteries to start up. The negative voltage control is proposed to reduce the leakage current caused by native n-type transistor and increase the efficiency. The proposed converter was designed using standard 0.18 µm CMOS process with chip size of 0.388 mm^2. The peak efficiency is 63% at load current of 1.5 mA. The proposed converter provides output voltage >1 V at maximum load current of 3.2 mA.

Keywords

• thermoelectric conversion
• energy harvesting
• DC-DC power convertors
• voltage control
• CMOS integrated circuits
• power MOSFET
• leakage currents
• low start-up voltage DC-DC converter
• negative voltage control
• thermoelectric energy harvesting
• current 1.5 mA
• current 3.2 mA
• voltage 300 mV
• thermoelectric generator
• peak efficiency
• 0.18 μm CMOS process
• leakage current reduction
• start-up switch
• native n-type MOS transistor
• low-power thermoelectric systems