A 14-ENOB Delta-Sigma-Based Readout Architecture for ECoG Recording Systems

This paper presents a delta-sigma based readout architecture targeting electrocortical recording in brain stimulation applications. The proposed architecture can accurately record a peak input signal up to 240 mV in a power-efficient manner without saturating or employing offset rejection techniques. The readout architecture consists of a delta-sigma modulator with an embedded analog front-end. The proposed architecture achieves a total harmonic distortion of -95 dB by employing a current-steering DAC and a multi-bit quantizer implemented as a tracking ADC. A system prototype is implemented in a 0.18 μm CMOS triple-well process and has a total power consumption of 54 μW. Measurement results, across 10 packaged samples, show approximately 14-ENOB over a 300Hz bandwidth with an input referred noise of 5.23 μVrms, power-supply/common-mode rejection ratio of 100 dB/98 dB and an input impedance larger than 94 MΩ.