Proposed ECE course: Board-level analog design
Bruce Land

Students have shown interest in learning how to design analog applications circuits at the board level.
Audience would be students who have taken 3150, so probably 4000-level.
Motivation is to acquaint students with integrated circuit building blocks, their use, and non-ideal behavior.

Possible topics:

• Op-amp as a building block for:
  • amp, diff-amp, filter, comparator
    • Active filters -- amp, phase, pulse considerations butterworth, bessel, chebyshev
    • VCVS, Sallen-Key, State Variable, Twin-T
    • differential amplifier common mode and noise control
  • real op-amp limitations in real circuits-- input Z, clipping, gain, noise, slew rate
  • Single and split power supply circuits
  • Computation of functions (approximate computing)
• Power distribution, bypassing and power line noise, AC line to board connections.
• EMI, coupling, noise control, grounding and shielding
• High impedance circuits, guarding, driven shields
  • biological electronics
• Analog timing/sequencing using dedicated timer integrated circuits
• Nonlinear modules such as analog multipliers, log-compression circuits, and timing circuits.
• Sensors -- temp, pressure, acceleration, concentration
• Motors -- I-V relationships, analog control
• Analog noise sources for synthesis
• Analog switches, multiplexors and switched capacitor filters
• Circuit isolation for noise control, safety, and function. Isolating power, analog signals.
• Radio? build an FM transmitter?

The course would be taught as a lecture/lab course, with emphasis on the simulation/testing cycle.
There would be about 4 lab assignments and a final project.
Possible labs/applications:

• Opamp modeling of gene oscillators
• Analog music synthesizer
• Analog Pulse oximeter -- IR pulse meter reading pulse rate out to analog voltmeter
• ECG from hands
• Stepper motor driver
• Analog computer
• Animal call generator (I have built circket and co-qui frog call using analog)
• Transistor models of the heart/nerve cells
• Optimal voice filtering
• AC line power meter

Labs and final projects would be limited to very little (or no) microcrocontroller technique, but the noise generated by a cpu would be instructive for some labs and analog aspects of interfacing (aliasing, accuracy, level shifting) could be useful.