A High-Precision Current-Mode Bandgap Reference with Nonlinear Temperature Compensation

• Published in: Micromachines (Basel) 2023-07, Vol.14 (7), p.1420
• Main Authors: Chen, Zhizhi, Wang, Qian, Li, Xi, Song, Sannian, Chen, Houpeng, Song, Zhitang
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Accuracy; bandgap current reference; Bipolar transistors; Circuit design; Circuits; Complementary metal oxide semiconductors; current-mode reference; Electric current regulators; Embedded systems; Energy gap; high-order curvature-compensated technique; Integrated circuits; Semiconductor chips; Semiconductor industry; temperature coefficient (TC); Temperature compensation; Temperature effects; Transistors; Voltage regulators
• ISSN: 2072-666X; 2072-666X
• DOI: 10.3390/mi14071420

A high-precision current-mode bandgap reference (BGR) circuit with a high-order temperature compensation is presented in this paper. In order to achieve a high-precision BGR circuit, the equation of the nonlinear current has been modified and the high-order term of the current flowing into the nonlinear compensation bipolar junction transistor (NLCBJT) is compensated further. According to the modified equation, two solutions are designed to improve the output accuracy of BGR circuits. The first solution is to divide the NLCBJT branch into two branches to reduce the coefficient of the nonlinear temperature compensation current. The second solution is to inject the nonlinear current into the two branches based on the first one to further eliminate the temperature coefficient (TC) of the current flowing into the NLCBJT. The proposed BGR circuit has been designed using the Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC) 55 nm CMOS process. The simulation results show that the variations in currents flowing into NLCBJTs improved from 148.41 nA to 69.35 nA and 7.4 nA, respectively, the TC of the output reference current of the proposed circuit is approximately 3.78 ppm/°C at a temperature range of -50 °C to 120 °C with a supply voltage of 3.3 V, the quiescent current consumption of the entire BGR circuit is 42.13 μA, and the size of the BGR layout is 0.044 mm , leading to the development of a high-precision BGR circuit.