Development of robust analog and mixed-signal electronics for extreme environment applications

The Integrated Circuits and Systems Laboratory at the University of Tennessee is currently investigating robust CMOS analog and mixed-signal circuit design techniques for extreme environments. In this paper, we present system level and transistor level extreme environment design techniques and measurement results from several test circuits. The design techniques focus on developing high performance operational transconductance amplifiers (OTAs) and op-amps that can operate over a wide temperature range. The test circuits include a 3.3-V ping-pong op-amp, a 3.3-V rail-to-rail I/O op-amp capable of driving resistive loads, and a temperature stable voltage reference and current reference.