A 66-dB Linear Dynamic Range, 100-dB·$\Omega$ Transimpedance Gain TIA With High-Speed PDSH for LiDAR

Abstract

A wide dynamic range (DR) receiver for the linear pulsed light detection and ranging (LiDAR) is presented, including a high linear DR transimpedance amplifier (TIA) with digital codes to vary its gain and a high-speed peak detector sample and hold (PDSH) circuit to capture the peak value of echo pulses. In order to extend the linear DR without reducing the bandwidth, a source follower is introduced to turn the common-gate amplifier into a large swing current mirror amplifier, leading to stable and low input impedance and three programmable transimpedance gain modes. For improving the precision of the PDSH circuit, a variable current source is utilized to replace the rectifying current mirror to alleviate the overshoot and pedestal voltage error. Implemented in 0.18-μm standard CMOS technology, the proposed TIA achieves a high linear DR of 66 dB with a wide bandwidth of 110 MHz, and the highest gain reaches 100 dB·Q. The error of PDSH circuit is less than 0.4% for 70-ns peaking width pulses with amplitude from 100 mV to 1.1 V. The receiver chip consumes 21 mW with a single 3.3-V supply, where the TIA and PDSH consume 8 and 13 mW, respectively.