Smart Power Unit - MW-to-nW Power Management and Control for Self-Sustainable IoT Devices

• Self-sustainability and intelligence will be critical features of the next generation of Internet of Things devices. Power management circuits need to be energy-efficient in multiple power modes, from nW sleep to mW active, and to support energy harvesting (EH) from multiple environmental sources. This article presents an adaptive and firmware-configurable power supply unit that enables intelligent devices to operate in the sub μW range while achieving self-sustainability through EH. The microcontroller-based design allows efficient conversion from batteries, dc, ac environmental sources, and nA quiescent currents. Source and load power points are decoupled with multiple dc-dc converters aiming to supply loads with adaptive voltage scaling and achieving high reliability. Experimental results show the flexibility and efficiency of this approach: the proposed power supply unit achieves a quiescent current of 54 nA and a maximum peak load current of 300 mA, delivered with an end-to-end power efficiency above 85%. © 1986-2012 IEEE.

Nyckelord

Energy efficiency

energy harvesting

energy management

event detection

Internet of Things

sensor systems and applications

DC-DC converters

Firmware

Sustainable development

Voltage scaling

Adaptive voltage scaling

Intelligent devices

Microcontroller based design

Peak load current

Power management and control

Power management circuits

Power supply unit

Quiescent currents

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