Integrated stabilized photovoltaic energy harvester

In this paper a photovoltaic power generator is presented. The energy harvesting device exploits the power generated by several on-chip micro-photovoltaic cells, connected in series, to provide the supply voltage and the reference voltages for an integrated voltage regulator. The regulator operates also with low illumination levels or large load currents, and tolerates a wide variation of the voltage produced by the micro-photovoltaic cell chain. In order to allow the series connection of several photovoltaic cells, we used an SOI technology, where parasitic p-n junctions to the substrate are not present.