Low power CMOS preamplifier for neural recording applications

Abstract

A fully-differential bandpass CMOS (complementary metal oxide semiconductor) preamplifier for extracellular neural recording is presented. The capacitive-coupled and capacitive-feedback topology is adopted. The preamplifier has a midband gain of 20.4 dB and a DC gain of 0. The −3 dB upper cut-off frequency of the preamplifier is 6.7 kHz. The lower cut-off frequency can be adjusted for amplifying the field or action potentials located in different bands. It has an input-referred noise of 8.2 μVrms integrated from 0.15 Hz to 6.7 kHz for recording the local field potentials and the mixed neural spikes with a power dissipation of 23.1 μW from a 3.3 V supply. A bandgap reference circuitry is also designed for providing the biasing voltage and current. The 0.22 mm2 prototype chip, including the preamplifier and its biasing circuitry, is fabricated in the 0.35-μm N-well CMOS 2P4M process.