The Penn State Research Foundation

Huichu Liu

Suman Datta

Vijaykrishnan Narayanan

Ramesh Vaddi

Alexandre Schmid

Xueqing Li

Unsuk Heo

Moon Seok Kim

Mahsa Shoaran

Disclosed are low power electronic devices configured to exploit the sub-threshold swing, unidirectional tunneling, and low-voltage operation of steep slope-tunnel tunnel field-effect transistors (TFET) to improve power-conversion efficiency and power-efficiency of electrical systems incorporating the TFET as an electrical component to perform energy harvesting, signal processing, and related operations. The devices include a HTFET-based rectifier having various topologies, a HTFET-based DC-DC charge pump converter, a HTFET-based amplifier having an amplifier circuit including a telescopic operational transconductance amplifier, and a HTFET-based SAR A/D converter having a HTFET-based transmission gate DFF. Any one of the devices may be used to generate a RF-powered system with improved power conversion efficiencies of power harvesters and power efficiencies of processing components within the system.

Low power nanoelectronics

A power rectifier includes a stage having a first Tunneling Field-Effect Transistor ('TFET') having a source, a gate, and a drain, a second TFET having a source, a gate, and a drain, a third TFET having a source, a gate, and a drain, and a fourth TFET having a source, a gate, and a drain such that the source of the first TFET, the source of the second TFET, the gate of the third TFET, and the gate of the fourth TFET are connected, the gate of the first TFET, the gate of the second TFET, the source of the third TFET and the source of the fourth TFET are connected, the drain of the first TFET and the drain of the third TFET are connected, and the drain of the second TFET and the drain of the fourth TFET are connected. Alternative embodiments are also disclosed.

Power rectifier using tunneling field effect transistor

Growing community of inventors

State College, PA, United States of America

Huichu Liu