Fully-integrated passive threshold-compensated PMOS rectifier for RF energy harvesting

This paper presents an RF-DC rectifier for radio frequency energy harvesting applications. The proposed passive multi-stage RF-DC rectifier uses standard PMOS transistors to allow individual bulk biasing without the requirement of deep nwell technology. The RF-DC conversion circuit is based on passive threshold self-compensated topology. A design strategy to enhance the input voltage range and to optimize the power conversion efficiency is presented. Designed and simulated in IBM 130-nm CMOS technology, the proposed 915-MHz rectifier shows improved output voltage and power conversion efficiency compared to recent works. When driving a 1-MΩ load, the RF-DC power conversion unit is able to supply 1-V output with an input power of -22 dBm (6.3 μW) and obtains an efficiency of 11.4% at -16.1 dBm (24.5 μW) while supplying 2-V to the output.