Design of a pyroelectric charge amplifier and a piezoelectric energy harvester for a novel non-invasive wearable and self-powered respiratory monitoring system

The paper presents a novel method of respiratory monitoring system based on pyroelectric material-based sensors. The system is designed to be convenient for the neonatal infants having a chronic breathing disorder known as apnea of prematurity. The front-end circuitry is designed in a 130 nm standard CMOS process. The incorporated design topology enables the system to operate with a lower cut-off frequency below 10 mHz with a noise efficiency factor as low as 2.79. The respiration monitoring system consists of a non-invasive wearable device that consumes very low power and has the potential to be self-powered by harvesting energy from a piezoelectric transducer. The overall system is very light-weight and requires attaching fewer electrodes and wires to the patient's body in comparison with the standard methods of respiration monitoring for apnea patients.