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Journal of Applied Sciences

Year: 2006 | Volume: 6 | Issue: 15 | Page No.: 2978-2990
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Authors

Mohamed Ghorbel

Mounir Samet

Ahmed Ben Hamida

Jean Tomas

Keywords

Research Article

A 16-electrode Fully Integrated and Versatile CMOS Microstimulator Dedicated to Cochlear Implant

Mohamed Ghorbel, Mounir Samet, Ahmed Ben Hamida and Jean Tomas
This study presents a 16-electrode fully integrated microstimulator dedicated to flexible and fully programmable stimulation for cochlear implant. This ASIC device was versatile and totally numerical in order to achieve a high degree of programmability. It could be adapted to any other external part of one cochlear prosthesis `the sound analyser` that could be driven by a digital signal processor `DSP`. Electronic circuit was conceived and then built around a digital controller stage piloting another analogue stimulation stage. The main internal functions assured during digital processing permitted to determine with great flexibility the stimulation current level and width to generate at each specified channel as well as the stimulation rhythm. Our implantable designed microchip which involves electrical stimulation to the auditory nerve fibbers includes sixteen programmable current drivers. Originality provided in such stimuli generation concerns the numerical stimulus current level ranging around ±1 mA with 10 bit resolution, the ~30 MΩ output impedance as well as the numerical current pulse width ranging up to 255 μs with 8 bit resolution. Microelectronic design of this biomedical device was based on the specific following technology: the AMI 0.35 μm, 3-metal, 2-poly, n-well standard CMOS process. Using 3.3 V supply, the maximum power consumption was estimated to 1.675 mW and the chip size was evaluated to 0.320 mm2.
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