A wide-range reconfigurable RF energy harvesting system with integrated storage and load regulation controller

Abstract

This paper presents an integrated RF energy harvesting system that uses a rectifier with 30 reconfigurable parallel stages to cover a wide input power range extending from -14dBm to 4dBm. The system mitigates the conduction losses associated with the reconfigurable switches via employing gate switching. Additionally, a voltage feedback loop is implemented to regulate the average output voltage level at the main load at 1V, while delivering the excess power to a secondary storage unit (supercapacitor) at 3V. Circuit simulations, using a 130 nm CMOS technology, show that the proposed design is capable of achieving a peak Power Conversion Efficiency (PCE) of 45% at 0dBm using an external matching network, and a maximum of 36% at 0dBm with internal matching. Additionally, the system achieves high PCE (>20%) for an input power range of more than 14dB, along with an excellent load regulation performance of 27mV, eliminating the need for extra voltage regulators at the output.