A low drop-out regulator for subcutaneous electrical stimulation of nanofibers used in muscle prosthesis

A low-dropout regulator (LDO) for the electrical stimulation of ionic electroactive polymers (iEAPs) used in subcutaneous muscle prosthesis is presented. The special requirement of the application and the characteristics of iEAPs impose several design challenges for the stimulator. In this paper, these challenges are discussed and solutions are provided. The proposed LDO, designed and simulated in IBM 0.13-μm CMOS technology, uses external-capacitor-less architecture to enable a fully on-chip solution for providing stable stimulation across a wide load range, as required by the properties of iEAPs. The LDO also offers precise line and load regulations, as well as improved power supply rejection (PSR) to suppress the supply noise when the LDO is powered up through wireless power transfer (WPT) links. Simulation results are provided suggesting that the proposed LDO can be used as a stable and precise stimulation source for controlling the movement of iEAPs with a potential application in muscle prostheses.

[1]  Philip K. T. Mok,et al.  Wide-Loading-Range Fully Integrated LDR With a Power-Supply Ripple Injection Filter , 2012, IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems II: Express Briefs.

[2]  Joseph W Freeman,et al.  In vivo skeletal muscle biocompatibility of composite, coaxial electrospun, and microfibrous scaffolds. , 2014, Tissue engineering. Part A.

[3]  Edgar Sanchez-Sinencio,et al.  Low Drop-Out Voltage Regulators: Capacitor-less Architecture Comparison , 2014, IEEE Circuits and Systems Magazine.

[4]  Kathryn Ziegler-Graham,et al.  Estimating the prevalence of limb loss in the United States: 2005 to 2050. , 2008, Archives of physical medicine and rehabilitation.

[5]  Laleh Najafizadeh,et al.  Towards a sub-1 V CMOS voltage reference , 2004, 2004 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems (IEEE Cat. No.04CH37512).

[6]  T. Takamori,et al.  Linear approximate dynamic model of ICPF (ionic conducting polymer gel film) actuator , 1996, Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation.

[7]  Laleh Najafizadeh,et al.  A coil misalignment compensation concept for wireless power transfer links in biomedical implants , 2015, 2015 IEEE Wireless Power Transfer Conference (WPTC).

[8]  S. Kritchevsky,et al.  The loss of skeletal muscle strength, mass, and quality in older adults: the health, aging and body composition study. , 2006, The journals of gerontology. Series A, Biological sciences and medical sciences.

[9]  Kerry Thoirs,et al.  Loss of Skeletal Muscle Mass after Stroke: a Systematic Review , 2010, International journal of stroke : official journal of the International Stroke Society.

[10]  Fan Yang,et al.  Switch-less adaptive feed-forward supply noise cancellation technique for capacitor-less LDR , 2014, 2014 IEEE 57th International Midwest Symposium on Circuits and Systems (MWSCAS).

[11]  Y. Amemiya,et al.  A 300 nW, 15 ppm/$^{\circ}$C, 20 ppm/V CMOS Voltage Reference Circuit Consisting of Subthreshold MOSFETs , 2009, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits.

[12]  Gabriel A. Rincon-Mora.  Analog IC Design with Low-Dropout Regulators (LDOs) , 2009 .

[13]  M. Swash,et al.  El Escorial revisited: Revised criteria for the diagnosis of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis , 2000, Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and other motor neuron disorders : official publication of the World Federation of Neurology, Research Group on Motor Neuron Diseases.

[14]  Chun Cheung,et al.  A low temperature coefficient voltage reference utilizing BiCMOS compensation technique , 2014, 2014 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems (ISCAS).

[15]  José Silva-Martínez,et al.  External Capacitor-Less Low Drop-Out Regulator With 25 dB Superior Power Supply Rejection in the 0.4–4 MHz Range , 2014, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits.

[16]  Franco Maloberti,et al.  An improved bandgap reference with high power supply rejection , 2002, 2002 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems. Proceedings (Cat. No.02CH37353).

[17]  Ka Nang Leung,et al.  A Low-Dropout Regulator for SoC With $Q$-Reduction , 2007, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits.

[18]  K. Leung,et al.  A capacitor-free CMOS low-dropout regulator with damping-factor-control frequency compensation , 2003, IEEE J. Solid State Circuits.

[19]  J. Freeman,et al.  Coaxial electrospun poly(ε-caprolactone), multiwalled carbon nanotubes, and polyacrylic acid/polyvinyl alcohol scaffold for skeletal muscle tissue engineering. , 2011, Journal of biomedical materials research. Part A.

[20]  Yoseph Bar-Cohen,et al.  Electroactive Polymer (EAP) Actuators as Artificial Muscles: Reality, Potential, and Challenges, Second Edition , 2004 .

[21]  Benjamin Chu,et al.  Myotube assembly on nanofibrous and micropatterned polymers. , 2006, Nano letters.