A High Conversion Gain Envelope Detector with Wide Input Range for Simultaneous Wireless Information and Power Transfer System

Wireless sensors networks (WSN) have been gradually facilitating the pervasive connectivity of wireless sensor nodes. A greater number of wireless sensors have been used in different aspects of our life. However, limited device battery life restricts the applications of large-scale WSN. This paper presents a batteryless envelope detector with radio frequency energy harvesting (RFEH) for wireless sensor nodes, which enables simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT). The envelope detector is designed for small modulation index AM signals with large amplitude variations. Therefore, the envelope detector is supposed to have wide input range while achieving a high conversion gain. We proposed an adaptive biasing technique in order to extend the input range of envelope detector. The input differential pair is adaptively biased through a feedback loop to overcome the variation of bias point when the amplitude of input signal changes. The cross coupled rectifier and DC-DC boost converter with maximum power point tracking (MPPT) are presented against power conversion efficiency (PCE) degradation of RF rectifier with the input power varying. The adaptive biased envelope detector is theoretically analyzed by square law MOSFET model. Designed with 0.18 μm complementary-metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) standard process, the power consumption of proposed envelope detector is 9 μW. Simulated with a 915 MHz AM input signal with 2 Mbps data rate and 0.05 modulation index, the proposed envelope detector achieves 20.37 dB maximum conversion gain when the amplitude of input signal is 0.5 V, and the PCE of energy harvesting circuits achieves 55.2% when input power is –12.5 dBm.