Integrated Batteryless Electron Timer

From the viewpoint of information security, the semiconductor timing devices are reviewed, and a promising cell with floating gate (FG) is proposed as an integrated batteryless electron timer. The first issue is the difficulty in the timing precision, which is related to the trap-detrapping phenomena in the tunnel oxide between the FG and the silicon surface. The basic idea to resolve this issue is to monitor the trap-free cells among a plurality of prepared cells. The integrated batteryless electron timer is composed of a plurality of single-polysilicon-type solid-state aging devices that are connected in parallel. The first sample is fabricated in a standard complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor process, and the measurements clearly exhibit the first evidence that we succeeded to remove the trap-detrapping-related fluctuation in the ticking operation. The resultant secondary issues on the precision, i.e., the manufacturing fluctuation (subjecting to the central-limit theorem) and the temperature dependence, are also briefly discussed.