A neuro-stimulus chip with telemetry unit for cochlear implant

This paper presents a 16-channel cochlear implant which supports 4 stimulus modes and provides a highest stimulus rate of 15k pulses per second per channel, and dynamic range of 60dB with the 10 bit D/A converter. The device consists of a coil, a rectifier and regulator, and a mixed analog and digital neuro-stimulus ASIC which decodes telemetry command and generates stimulus signals. The chip is fabricated using 1.2μm 2M/2P standard CMOS process and the die size is 3.56 mm × 3.67mm. The circuit is working properly at a telemetry data rate of 500 Kbps in carrier of 10 MHz while the peak power consumption is 35 mW.