Smallest Ever On-Chip Low-Pass Filter Invented

The world’s smallest on-chip low pass filter is 1,000 times smaller than current off-chip filters. It has been designed effectively by a research team from Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore.

The circuit that allows low-frequency signals to take across along with lowering unnecessary high-frequency signals from taking across is called a low-pass filter. In comparison to the current off-chip filters, which are separated and quite big, on-chip filters grab a little space on integrated circuit chips, which may be available in mobile devices such as cell phones, notebook computers, speed guns used to monitor traffic, as well as radars placed in vehicles.

Nanyang Technological University and Economic Development Board launched VIRTUS, a latest Integrated Circuit Design Centre of Excellence. The effectual accomplishment of this experiment project was declared just 10 months ago at the official opening of this new IC design centre of excellence.

Yeo Kiat Seng, head of circuits and systems at NTU's School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering is the main person behind this innovation. It is expected that the advancement in design for this filter will revolutionize wireless communication.

"This new low-pass filter can lead to a significant improvement in signal quality as it removes nearly all unwanted interferences and noise in the environment," said Professor Yeo.

"This results in clearer reception and enhanced clarity for mobile phone users and users of wireless applications such as Bluetooth and other mobile devices. For example, if you are speaking to your friend on your mobile phone in a noisy food centre or in a train, you would still be able to hear him clearly."

"The filter also consumes less power and can be easily incorporated into existing integrated circuit chips at almost no cost. This means that in addition to better signal quality, consumers enjoy lower power consumption without any additional cost," he included.

A new horizon has been uncovered because of the invention of the new filter which leads more research and development of high-performance integrated circuits and wireless communication products. With this filter, integrated circuit chips can come to latest applications for transmitting digital audio/video data (uncompressed) and fast wireless local area networks for instant wireless file transfer.

Integrated Circuit Designs and Extensions

Dependability on semiconductor devices by the electronic systems is increasing day-by-day because the integration level is growing quicker than ever and it is necessary to pack more circuitry in the smallest packages. Various circuit components, which are required to complete computer systems such as, capacitors, transistors, resistors, etc, can be installed on an individual silicon die.

When a package holds individual silicon (silicon germanium for RF circuits, or gallium arsenide for microwave frequency circuits) that builds up either portion of a bigger electronic circuit or system or an entire electronic system in its own right is called an Integrated Circuit (IC). When a full electronic system is created by the IC, it is generally mentioned as a SoC (System on a Chip). Present-day communication ICs are of SoC designs.

MCM (Multichip Module) comprises more than one dies and it is an extension to the IC; we can say for example, circuits and sensors are to be accommodated in an individual package but which is not possible to be set up on an individual die. The MCM was mentioned as a hybrid circuit at the beginning, which consists of multiple ICs and inactive components on a common circuit base that are unified by conductors set up within that base. Complications related to size reduction and signal degradation can be alleviated by implementing MCM.

An extension to the IC is the multichip module (MCM), which contains multiple dies; for example, when sensors and circuits are to be housed in a single package but which cannot be fabricated on a single die. Originally referred to as a hybrid circuit, the MCM consists of two or more ICs and passive components on a common circuit base that are interconnected by conductors fabricated within that base. The MCM helps with size reduction problem and helps alleviate signal degradation.

Devices are piled vertically on system in a package (SiP), which is an extension to the MCM. Wire bonding to the substrate is usual. An extension to the SiP is the package on a package (PoP).

Integrated Circuit Design

IC design or Integrated Circuit design is a sub-category of electronic engineering, encircling the specific logic and circuit design techniques needed to design integrated circuits, or ICs. ICs comprise small-scale electronic components such as resistors, transistors, capacitors, etc. fabricated into an electrical grid on a monolithic semiconductor.

Digital and analog IC designs are the two wide categories of IC design. Components like microprocessors, FPGAs, different memories (such as: RAM, ROM, and flash) and digital ASICs are produced by digital IC design. Digital design’s main focusing points are logical rightness, ensuring maximum circuit density, and placing circuits to ensure efficient routing of clock and timing signals. Power IC design and RF IC design are the fields in which Analog IC design has specialism. Analog IC design is used in the design of phase locked loops, op-amps, oscillators, linear regulators and active filters. Analog design bothers about the physics of the semiconductor devices like resistance, gain, power dissipation and matching. Integrity of analog signal amplification and filtering is generally critical and for this reason, analog integrated circuits use comparatively bigger area active devices than digital IC designs and commonly not so much dense in circuitry.

Wafer-Scale Graphene Integrated Circuit

It is alleged by the scientists of IBM research that they have reached a milestone in forming a building block for the subsequent wireless devices. In a paper disclosed in the journal Science, IBM researchist made public the maiden integrated circuit built from wafer-size graphene, and revealed a broadband frequency mixer functioning at frequencies up to 10 gigahertz (10 billion cycles per second).

Aimed at wireless communications, this analog integrated circuit based on graphene would make better recent wireless devices and beckons to the possibility for a new set of applications. Among the conventional frequencies of present, transceiver and cell phone signals could be advanced, possibly allowing phones to function where they can't today while, at much higher frequencies, military and medical personnel could see covert weapons or operate medical imaging without the similar radiation riskiness of X-rays.

Graphene is the narrowest electronic material which is composed of a single layer of carbon atoms packed in a honeycomb formation, possesses exceptional electrical, mechanical, optical and thermal characteristics that could make it not so much costly and use less power in mobile electronics like smart phones.

In spite of noteworthy scientific advancement in the comprehension of this unprecedented material and the demonstration of high-performance graphene-based devices, the difficulty of combining graphene transistors with other components on an individual chip had not been cognized up to now, majorly because of the deficient adherence of graphene with metals and oxides and the need of dependable fabrication schemes to generate formative circuits and devices.

This latest integrated circuit is composed of a graphene transistor and a set of two inductors compactly built-in on a silicon carbide (SiC) wafer, surpasses these design obstacles by advancing wafer-scale fabrication methods that keep up the standard of graphene and, at the same time, make allowance for its consolidation to other elements in an intricate circuitry.

In this presentation, thermal annealing of SiC wafers synthesized graphene to comprise stable graphene layers on the surface of SiC. Four layers of metal and two layers of oxide are needed by the fabrication of graphene circuits to make top-gated graphene transistor, interconnects and on-chip inductors.

The circuit functions as a broadband frequency mixer, which generates output signals with varied frequencies (aggregate and difference) of the input signals. Mixers are considered as basic elements of various electronic communication systems. This graphene integrated circuit has been presented as capable of frequency mixing up to 10 GHz and fantastic thermal stability up to 125°C.

The fabrication scheme demonstrated can also be used in other types of graphene materials, including chemical vapor deposited (CVD) graphene films synthesized on metal films, and are also suitable for optical lithography for minimized cost and throughput. In the past, the team has demonstrated stand-alone graphene transistors with a cut-off frequency as high as 100 GHz and 155 GHz for epitaxial and CVD graphene, for a gate length of 240 and 40 nm, respectively.

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