Project Video
Introduction
In this project we developed a Ultrasonic Sensor Receiver ICs that is compatible with both voltage-based and current-based ultrasonic sensors. The chip features an analog front-end (AFE) with a selectable input stage comprising of a low-noise preamplifier stage, a digitally programmable-gain amplifier and a filter, as well as a 8-bit SAR ADC, that was designed by the Doppelganger - Doppler Radar Receiver team, for data processing. This project is a fulfillment of the course ELEN E6350, instructed by Prof. Peter Kinget in Spring 2022. The fabrication and packaging of this chip was made possible through the sponsorship by Apple Inc. The team would like to thank them for their generosity.
The motivation for this project comes from the desire to utilize thin-film piezoelectrics [2] as a sensor for ultrasonic vocalizations in mammals as a means to study their behavior. Aside from this general application, ultrasonic sensors in this frequency range can be used as a receiver in an ultrasonic distance sensor. An example of this application can be found in the example application
This chip interfaces with either voltage or current based piezoelectric sensors and amplifies the induced signal in the frequency range of 10 kHz - 70 kHz with a programmable gain determined by the user. The amplified signal is further processed by an on-chip 8-bit SAR ADC, that outputs a stream of digital data at a rate of 1 Msps. It works with a supply voltage of 1.0V.
