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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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The printed & flexible electronics market will reach ~$950M in 2020 with a 27% CAGR in market value, estimates Yole Développement

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Yole Développement announces its Flexible Applications Based on Printed Electronics Technologies 2013 report. Yole Développement’s report provides up-to-date market forecast 2013-2020, roadmaps and timelines for printed, flexible, and printed & flexible applications. Also, it analyses the function vs. flexibility, current technical & economic challenges, manufacturing process and focuses on polytronics.
Technical challenges are close to being overcome to reach US$1B market by 2020
Today flexible & printed electronics create a lot of hope. And a supply chain is being created to support an industrial infrastructure. In its report, Yole Développement has identified and tracked the five main functionalities of flexible & printed electronics: displaying, sensing, lighting, energy generating and substrates. The different degrees of freedom in flexibility that can be obtained can be divided into:
• Conformable substrate: the flexible substrate will be shaped in a definitive way after processing
• “Bendable” substrate: they can be rolled and bent many times (even if we consider it will not be a key feature coming from customer needs)
• “Unused” flexibility: in the end, the flexibility is not an added value to the customer
Yole Développement’s analysts believe some applications will be more likely than other to be successful – for example, bendable applications will undergo tough stress during use and technological challenges will be hard to overcome. The report shows the distinction between the functions (displaying, lighting, energy conversion, sensing & substrates) and the seek flexibility “degree of freedom”. Yole Développement does not make the distinction in its report between organic and inorganic substrates as semiconductors can also be used as flexible substrates.
However, the team of analysts believe over the next several years, the number of applications using printing processes for flexible electronics will grow.
“We estimate the printed & flexible electronics market will grow from ~ $176M in 2013 to ~ $950M in 2020 with a 27% CAGR in market value. Printed OLED displays for large size (TVs) are likely to become the largest market,” explains Dr Eric Mounier, Senior Analyst, MEMS Devices & Technologies, at Yole Développement. For OLED lighting, Yole Développement believes it will grow but remain a niche market for automotive and/ or office lighting. For PV, the market demand by 2020 will remain very low compared to the demand for rigid PV, largely below 1% of the global market demand by 2020. Sensor, smart system & polytronic applications will include sensors, touchless / touch screens, RF ID applications.
A wide, exciting range of new applications
Printed & flexible electronics is a new exiting technology with large potential market expectations. Indeed, as semiconductors move to the very small with 22nm critical dimension, printed electronics moves to the other end of the spectrum with its own material, equipment, process challenges and supply chain. Printed electronics will not kill semiconductor electronics as it will not be a replacement for CMOS silicon. However, it will create new industry segments and new classes of applications with unique features, benefits and costs that cannot be addressed with conventional semiconductor electronics.
For example, Yole Développement’s analysts believe printing technologies will also allow additional properties such as flexibility. Originally, the general vision for printed electronics was the possibility to print low cost electronic components on any substrate. It was supposed to allow low cost, low efficiency, large volume electronics manufacturing, and it was supposed to create a large multiplicity of applications. Flexible electronics appeared quite soon after envisaging printability. Such devices were supposed to allow new applications directly linked to flexibility.
Moreover, the coming of polytronic technologies is a disruptive approach that could change the way printed & flexible electronic devices will be manufactured. It can be considered a new alternative to the “More Moore” approach where Si ICs, thin films, micro batteries, displays etc. … will be embedded in a flexible substrate. The global interest in polytronics is born from the difficulties faced by the flexible & printed electronics industry. It is an alternate way to come to similar results while trying to avoid some of the main challenges.