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High CMRR Instrumentation Amplifier (Schematic and Layout) design for biomedical applications

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Instrumentation amplifiers are intended to be used whenever acquisition of a useful signal is difficult. IA’s must have extremely high input impedances because source impedances may be high and/or unbalanced. bias and offset currents are low and relatively stable so that the source impedance need not be constant. Balanced differential inputs are provided so that the signal source may be referenced to any reasonable level independent of the IA output load reference. Common mode rejection, a measure of input balance, is very high so that noise pickup and ground drops, characteristic of remote sensor applications, are minimized.Care is taken to provide high, well characterized stability of critical parameters under varying conditions, such as changing temperatures and supply voltages. Finally, all components that are critical to the performance of the IA are internal to the device. The precision of an IA is provided at the expense of flexibility. By committing to the one specific task of
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Low Voltage Audio Amplifier

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This experimental (3) transistor class A audio power amplifier delivers 25mW into an 8Ω load, or 50mW into a 4Ω load using only a 1.5V power source. At such low voltages, there are many issues to consider and much to learn. To the best of my knowledge the following information is new to the world.
Theoretical minimum vs. practical minimum voltage

For a silicon bipolar transistor, the initial voltage requirement is to exceed the Vbe junction voltage of 0.6V. Then, to be able to current regulate this voltage via a series resistor, the source voltage must be about double this or about 1.2V. (The rule of thumb for shunt voltage regulators is that the source voltage is recommended to be double the regulated voltage.) This is perhaps the theoretical minimum Vcc. The practical minimum takes into consideration low voltage power sources – in this case, the ubiquitous 1.5V single cell battery is perhaps the standard low voltage power source – this is the power source for my circuit.