Design automation of a fully differential switched capacitor amplifier using a telescopic cascode OTA

In this paper, we propose a design procedure and an automated design flow for a fully differential switched capacitor amplifier. The proposed procedure uses the gm/ID design methodology, which relies on searching lookup tables pre-generated from accurate simulation models. A set of specifications including power consumption, noise, bandwidth, gain, static error, and output swing is used to constrain the design process. The operational transconductance amplifier (OTA) is implemented using a telescopic cascode architecture. The automation program is written in MATLAB and is capable of generating sizing parameters, writing circuit netlists, running simulations, and displaying and analyzing simulation results. A design example is used to verify the proposed program, where Cadence Spectre is used to verify the achievement of the required circuit specifications.