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    Modelling, analysis and design of bioelectronic circuits in VLSI : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Electronics and Computer Engineering at Massey University, Albany, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2015) Alam, Sadia
    Biological phenomena at the molecular level are being imitated by electronic circuits. The immense effectiveness and versatility of bioelectronic circuits have yielded multiple benefits to both the electronic, and the biological worlds. Advancement in technology is being made towards the design and implementation of these systems due to their extreme proficiency and extraordinary capabilities. Development of bioelectronic circuits is assisting researchers to gain deep insights into complex processes of life. These systems are classified into different categories depending on the various kinds and nature of the biological processes. Cytomorphic and neuromorphic circuits are two major classifications of the bioelectronic systems. Cytomorphic circuits mimic the biological processes taking place inside a living cell. Activities involved in DNA-protein interactions play a vital role for the survival of living organisms. This thesis illustrates modelling and the design of the cytomorphic circuits in VLSI representing the DNA-protein interactions at the molecular level. Electronic circuits imitating neural activities are classified as neuromorphic circuits. The significance of these bioelectronic circuits cannot be denied. Hence, an effort is made in this research to model neuron-to-neuron communication process through electronic circuit components in VLSI. For an electronic representation of these phenomena, biological to electrical analogies are determined, analysed, and modelled. Circuit design validation is accomplished by comparing the circuit results with experimentally reported biological data. The cytomorphic circuit is capable of analysing the cellular behaviour of living organisms, while the neuromorphic circuit is competent to mimic the neurological processes that are dependent on neuron-to-neuron combination such as neural DNA transcription initiation. Biological experimentation on bacteria Escherichia coli is carried out that validates that the cytomorphic VLSI circuit design is capable of predicting gene behaviour of living organisms. The neuromorphic circuit is fabricated using 0.13µm IBM CMOS technology and fabrication results are illustrated in the thesis. Electronic gene oscillators and neural DNA transcription initiation circuits are illustrated as applications of the proposed VLSI bioelectronic circuit designs.
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    VLSI design, fabrication and testing of an ultra-wideband low noise amplifier microchip using nanometric CMOS technology : [a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of] Doctor of Philosophy in Engineering, Integrated Circuit Design at School of Engineering and Technology of Massey Univeristy [i.e. University], Albany, November 2011
    (Massey University, 2011) Khurram, Muhammad
    The wide operating bandwidth of the ultra-wideband (UWB) signal leads to new circuit design challenges and methodologies. Similar to any other RF system, the most critical component of the UWB receiver is the low noise amplifier (LNA). Contrary to the narrowband LNAs, the single-tone assumption is not valid for defining the SNR of an UWB LNA where the input signal encompasses several GHz. Defining the UWB LNA system’s SNR as the matched filter bound (MFB) is an appropriate approach to deduce its noise figure (NF). Using this approach, a mathematical model is proposed to achieve optimal NF, employing the gm-boosted common gate (CG) LNA topology along with a passive noise matching input network. Besides the low noise performance, the other challenges in the design of the UWB LNA include adequate input match and forward power gain with low power dissipation. Considering the superior performance of the gm-boosted CG amplifier topology for UWB, a new single-ended (SE) gm-boosted CG UWB LNA architecture is proposed in this research. In the SE LNA architecture, the power dissipation is further minimized by sharing the bias current between the gm-boosted CG and the active gmboosting amplifier stages in a current-reuse fashion (“piggyback” gm-boosting). The proposed piggyback gm-boosted CG LNA, operating in 3-5 GHz range, is fabricated using 130nm RFCMOS process with adequate results. The noise optimization mathematical model proposed in this thesis is applied to the new piggyback gm-boosted CG LNA architecture by including an intervening noise matching passive network at the input of the LNA. The bandwidth of the noise matched piggyback gm-boosted CG LNA is extended using series peaking technique to the complete UWB band from 3.1 to 10.6 GHz. The proposed full-band noise matched UWB LNA is fabricated in a differential manner using 130nm RFCMOS process and exhibited excellent performance improvements with figure of merit (FOM) of 2.86.