Design of an auto-zeroed, differential, organic thin-film field-effect transistor amplifier for sensor applications

David M. Binkley, Nikhil Verma, Robert L. Crawford, Erik Brandon, Thomas Nelson Jackson

Research output: Contribution to journalConference articlepeer-review

6 Scopus citations

Abstract

Organic strain gauge and other sensors require high-gain, precision dc amplification to process their low-level output signals. Ideally, amplifiers would be fabricated using organic thin-film field-effect transistors (OTFT's) adjacent to the sensors. However, OTFT amplifiers exhibit low gain and high input-referred dc offsets that must be effectively managed. This paper presents a four-stage, cascaded differential OTFT amplifier utilizing switched capacitor auto-zeroing. Each stage provides a nominal voltage gain of four through a differential pair driving low-impedance active loads, which provide common-mode output voltage control, p-type pentacene OTFT's are used for the amplifier devices and auto-zero switches. Simulations indicate the amplifier provides a nominal voltage gain of 280 V/V and effectively amplifies a 1-mV dc signal in the presence of 500-mV amplifier input-referred dc offset voltages. Future work could include the addition of digital gain calibration and offset correction of residual offsets associated with charge injection imbalance in the differential circuits.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Article number16
Pages (from-to)41-52
Number of pages12
JournalProceedings of SPIE - The International Society for Optical Engineering
Volume5522
DOIs
StatePublished - Dec 1 2004
EventOrganic Field-Effect Transistors III - Denver, CO, United States
Duration: Aug 3 2004Aug 5 2004

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Electronic, Optical and Magnetic Materials
  • Condensed Matter Physics
  • Computer Science Applications
  • Applied Mathematics
  • Electrical and Electronic Engineering

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