On-Chip Sinusoidal Signal Generators for Electrical Impedance Spectroscopy: Methodological Review

Area of Science:

• Electrical Engineering
• Biomedical Engineering
• Signal Processing

Background:

• Increasing interest in on-chip electrical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) systems for biomedical applications.
• On-chip EIS systems offer low power and small form factors.
• On-chip sinusoidal signal generators (SSGs) are critical for EIS system performance.

Purpose of the Study:

• To review architectures and circuit implementations of on-chip SSGs for EIS.
• To discuss techniques for waveform generation, linearity enhancement, and current injection.
• To compare and summarize state-of-the-art on-chip SSG designs.

Main Methods:

• Review of existing literature on SSG architectures and circuit implementations.
• Analysis of techniques used in waveform generation, linearity enhancement, and current injection stages.
• Comparison of different state-of-the-art on-chip SSG designs based on performance metrics.

Main Results:

• On-chip SSGs are typically composed of three stages: waveform generation, linearity enhancement, and current injection.
• Key requirements for on-chip SSGs include high linearity, wide frequency range, and high power/area efficiency.
• Various techniques exist for each stage, each with advantages and disadvantages.

Conclusions:

• On-chip SSGs are essential for enabling advanced on-chip EIS systems.
• The choice of techniques for each stage impacts the overall performance and precision of the EIS system.
• This review provides a comprehensive overview for researchers and designers in the field.