SIDO: A single‐input double‐output energy harvesting architecture operating in burst mode with 74.87% peak end‐to‐end efficiency

Abstract

A single-input double-output (SIDO) energy harvesting architecture implemented with the off-the-shelf components is presented in this paper. The proposed SIDO consists of a step-up converter, a supercapacitor, an output routing control circuit (ORCC), and two output power switches for two loads. Once the supercapacitor charges to a maximum voltage level of nearly 3.7 V, output power switches are successively turned on by the ORCC for a short period of time (i.e., burst mode). The proposed SIDO supports output total power range from 2.694 to 196.76 mW which is in the range of 1.684 to 122.975 times greater than the maximum power available from the ambient energy source (e.g., 1.6 mW) due to the burst mode. Also, the proposed SIDO achieves a peak end-to-end efficiency of 74.87% with the self-starting, that is, no need of batteries other than the ambient energy source. As compared with prior work, the proposed SIDO supports the heaviest loads (e.g., total power of 196.76 mW) and achieves a wide support range with the burst mode operation and starts the operation from the lowest input voltage without the need of the external power source.