[paper] 400 fJ Per-Cycle Frequency Reference for IoT

A 400 fJ Per-Cycle Frequency Reference for Internet of Things

Mathieu Coustans, François Krummenacher, Christian Terrier and Maher Kayal

IEL, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland

Abstract—This work presents an ultra-low power oscillator designed to target different contexts, such as crystal-assisted time keeping, reference oscillator to optimize the always on domain of a microcontroller or wake-up timer. This oscillator enables ultra-low power operation in 180nm CMOS technology with EKV3 compact model; the core oscillator consumes 2.5 nW at room temperature, with a temperature stability of 14 ppm/°C [-40°C - 60°C] and 0.07 %/V supply sensitivity [read more...]