An ultra-low power fully integrated energy harvester based on self-oscillating switched-capacitor voltage doubler

This paper presents a fully integrated energy harvester that maintains > 35% end-to-end efficiency when harvesting from a 0.84 mm² solar cell in low light condition of 260 lux, converting 7 nW input power from 250 mV to 4 V. Newly proposed self-oscillating switched-capacitor (SC) DC-DC voltage doublers are cascaded to form a complete harvester, with configurable overall conversion ratio from 9× to 23×. In each voltage doubler, the oscillator is completely internalized within the SC network, eliminating clock generation and level shifting power overheads. A single doubler has > 70% measured efficiency across 1 nA to 0.35 mA output current (>10⁵ range) with low idle power consumption of 170 pW. In the harvester, each doubler has independent frequency modulation to maintain its optimum conversion efficiency, enabling optimization of harvester overall conversion efficiency. A leakage-based delay element provides energy-efficient frequency control over a wide range, enabling low idle power consumption and a wide load range with optimum conversion efficiency. The harvester delivers 5 nW-5 μW output power with > 40% efficiency and has an idle power consumption <3 nW, in test chip fabricated in 0.18 μm CMOS technology.