Practical Application Of Transconductance-To-Drain-Current Dependent Flicker Noise Analysis

Previous studies have shown that the transconductance-to-drain-current ratio (g(m)/I-D) based technique is useful for noise analysis and optimization of analog CMOS circuits. In this paper, we examine flicker noise closely and show that even though its slope ( A) does not depend g(m)/I-D parameters of a transistor, knowledge of g(m)/I-D parameters is required in order to determine its slope accurately. We take a look at several complications that arise in practice, and propose a rule that simplifies the process of de-embedding the slope of flicker noise. Finally, we apply the results in the design and analysis of a micropower operational transconductance amplifier (OTA) and show that excellent agreement between simulation and analysis is achieved.