Operational Transconductance Amplifier

1.INTRODUCTION
An Operational Amplifier (op-amp) is a DC-coupled high-gain electronic voltage
amplifier with a differential input and, usually, a single-ended output. In this
configuration, an op-amp produces an output potential (relative to circuit ground) that is
configuration, an op-amp produces an output potential (relative to circuit ground) that is
input terminals.

Operational amplifiers had their origins in analog computers, where they were used
to do mathematical operations in many linear, non-linear and frequency-dependent
circuits.Characteristics of a circuit using an op-amp are set by external components with
little dependence on temperature changes or manufacturing variations in the op-amp itself,
which makes op-amps popular building blocks for circuit design.

Op-amps are among the most widely used electronic devices today, being used in a vast
array of consumer, industrial, and scientific devices. Many standard IC op-amps cost only
a few cents in moderate production volume; however some integrated or hybrid
operational amplifiers with special performance specifications may cost over $100 US in
small quantities. Op-amps may be packaged as components, or used as elements of more
complex integrated circuits.

The op-amp is one type of differential amplifier. Other types of differential amplifier
include the fully differential amplifier (similar to the op-amp, but with two outputs),
the instrumentation amplifier (usually built from three op-amps), the isolation amplifier
(similar to the instrumentation amplifier, but with tolerance to common-mode voltages
that would destroy an ordinary op-amp), and negative feedback amplifier (usually built
from one or more op-amps and a resistive feedback network).
OPERATION:-

Vout = AOL(V+ — V–)

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Where V+ is non-inverting voltage, V- is inverting voltage and Aol is the open loop GAIN.

Fig.1:Diagram Symbol for Op-Amp

2.OPERATIONAL TRANSCONDUCTANCE AMPLIFIER

An operational transconductance amplifier (OTA) is a voltage controlled current

source(VCCS) i:e it is an amplifier whose differential input voltage produces an output
current. Earlier emphasis was on amplifiers with feedback, such as op-amps. Thus the
commercial OTAs were not meant to be used in open loop mode. The maximum input
voltage for typical bipolar OTA is of order of only 30mV, but with a transconductance
gain tunability range of several decades. Since then, a number of researchers have
investigated ways to increase the input voltage range and to linearise the OTA.

1. Its output of a current contrasts to that of standard operational amplifier whose

output is a voltage.
2. It is usually used "open-loop"; without negative feedback in linear applications.
This is possible because the magnitude of the resistance attached to its output
controls its output voltage.
BASIC OPERATION:

Fig.2:operation

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In the ideal OTA, the output current is a linear function of the differential input voltage,
calculated as follows:

Iout = (Vin+ — Vin–). gm

Where Vin+ is the voltage at the non-inverting input, V in– is the voltage at the inverting
input and gm is the transconductance of the amplifier. The amplifier's output voltage is the
product of its output current and its load resistance.

Vout = Iout. Rload

The voltage gain is then the output voltage divided by the differential input voltage.

The transconductance of the amplifier is usually controlled by an input current, denoted Iabc
("amplifier bias current"). The amplifier's transconductance is directly proportional to this
current. This is the feature that makes it useful for electronic control of amplifier gain, etc.

3.Working of OTA

An OTA is a voltage controlled current source, more specifically the term

“operational” comes from the fact that it takes the difference of two voltages as the input
for the current conversion. The ideal transfer characteristic is therefore

IOut = Gm(VIn+ − VIn− )

or, by taking the pre-computed difference as the input, Iout = GmVin

with the ideally constant transconductance gm as the proportionality factor between the
two. In reality the transconductance1 is also a function of the input differential voltage and
dependent on temperature, as we will later see.

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Fig.3: Transconductance amplifier with floating load

To summarize, an ideal OTA has two voltage inputs with infinite impedance (i.e.
there is no input current). The common mode input range is also infinite, while the
differential signal between these two inputs is used to control an ideal current source (i.e.
the output current does not depend on the output voltage) that functions as an output. The
proportionality factor between output current and input differential voltage is called
transconductance.

Any real OTA will thus have circuitry to process the input voltages with low input
current over a wide common mode input range, to produce an internal representation of
the input differential voltage and to provide a current to the output that is relatively
independent of the output voltage. Since an OTA can be used without feedback, the
maximum output current and with it the transconductance can often be adjusted.A
transconductance amplifier converts an input of voltage to an output of current. It is also
called a current to voltage converter or I to V converter. It is called transconductance
because the efficiency of the amplifier is measured in units of
conductance.Transconductance amplifiers are classified into two types. They are
transconductance amplifiers with floating load and transconductance amplifiers with
grounded load.

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4.Types Of Operational Transconductance Amplifier

4.1 Simple Operational Transconductance Amplifier: It is the basic operational

transconductance amplifier with only a current- mirror circuit, a differential input and a
current sink inverter. Although simple
OTA’s are single input these are unsymmetrical an is not considered for analysis. We have
used differential amplifier as current mirror load as simple OTA. The equations and
analysis part remains the same as discussed above.

Fig.4: simple OTA

4.2Fully Differential Operational Transconductance Amplifier: Fully differential

operational transconductance amplifier contains simple inversely connected current-mirror
pairs. These current mirror pairs are used as active load in the circuit. Along with these
current mirror pair we have a differential circuit for which we have differential inputs. We
also have a current sink inverter attached to the differential circuit. This amplifier is fully
symmetrical and their main advantage is due to these characteristics only. The equations
stated above in section 2.2 remains same for fully differential OTA. The(W/L) values are
taken same as calculated above.

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Fig.5: Fully Differential OTA

The circuit shown is taken and various parameters are calculated. The circuit illustrates in
is the proposed circuit in which there are few changes compared to circuit and is simple
and suitable for implementation. In this circuit instead of current source I1 we have used
current sink load. The other difference is using of 2 pmos current mirror pairs and 1 pair of
nmos.

Fig.6: Fully Differential OTA Proposed

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4.3Balanced Operational Transconductance Amplifier (BOTA):

BOTA is the modified circuit of the two discussed above. It contains three current mirrors,
a differential circuit and a current sink inverter. These are symmetrical too and have better
parameters than the two discussed above.

Fig.7: Balanced OTA

The main advantage of BOTA is that filters realized using BOTA provide more simplify
structures and perform better performance in higher frequency range than the single output
OTA’S.

Fig.8: Balanced OTA

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The difference between the two Balanced OTA i:e the one taken from the reference no
and the one that is proposed is adding the current sink load and removing current source
I1. The other difference is using of 2 pmos current mirror pairs and 1 pair of nmos.

5.APPLICATIONS

1.The OTA as voltage controlled resistor If you have a resistor that is referenced to the
virtual ground of an operational amplifier, then it is easy to use an OTA to make that
resistance voltage controlled. The resistor is replaced by a voltage divider to the real
ground so that the divider puts out about 5 mV, which gets connected to the positive input
of the OTA. The negative input is connected to ground as well, while the output of the
OTA goes into the virtual ground of the operational amplifier. The apparent resistance can
then be controlled by adjusting I0 accordingly.

2.Active Filters with the OTA

Active filters are a standard application of the op-amp which can benefit greatly from the
controllability of the OTA . The rudimentary theory and the circuit schematics for the
basic active filters using op-amps are presented in many of the textbooks in use in
Electronics Technology or Engineering programs. What makes the OTA so attractive in
these circuits is the ability to form filter circuits with voltage-variable control (via the IABC
input) over a n umber of key performance parameters of the filter. The controlled
parameter can be the midband gain of the circuit, as already realized in the simple circuits
in the previous section.

3. OTA-based active filters can use the external bias setting to control the location of the
critical frequency, or 3-dB frequency, in a filter. The next logical step in controllability is
the provision for independent gain and critical frequency setting. A number of other active
filters can be realized with the OTA. These provide the ability to not only change the
critical frequency, the gain, or both, but also to preserve the shape of the response. For
instance, one might want to control the critical frequency of the filter, but without altering

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the passband ripple. It is even possible to change the type of response from lowpass to
allpass to highpass by continuous adjustment of the transconductance gm.

4.OTAs are used in a variety of radio frequency (RF), intermediate frequency (IR), and
highperformance video applications.
5.OTAs can be used in products such as automatic gain control (AGC) amplifiers, fast
control loop amplifiers, and control amplifiers for capacitive sensors and active filters.
6.OTAs can also be used in light emitting diode (LED) driver circuits for fiber optic
transmissions, integrators for fast pulses, and as currentcontrolled oscillators.

6.Advantages:

• Higher gm allows higher bandwidth, and lower thermal /random noise

• Lower gm allows smaller(less area needed )for active loads or mirrors
in transconductance amplifiers.
• Very high current allowing a pretty large input resistance

7.Disadvantages:

• The resulting transconductance which determines the voltage gainof a

DARLINGTON stage is only 50%
• Vbe is effectively doubled to about 1.4v, and just two transistors

8.CONCLUSION

The Operational Transconductance amplifiers are important building

blocks for various analog circuits and systems which were previously
implemented by using OPAMP. Currently, research is on for implementation
of OTA circuits that will be highly linear, consume less amount of power and
operate at low power supply. Processing of a signal is not possible without
filters. From the above design of 1st order LP filter we can analyze that

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cascading of filters leads to the higher order filter with reduced transition
band. On increasing order of the filter transition band can be reduced but it
may lead to unstable the system due to large number of capacitors. We call
our proposed OTA based LPF as tunable because by adjusting the values of
power supply and sink current we can get different pass band gain less than
unity. Again, the high cut-off frequency can be adjusted by changing simply
the values of resistor, R and capacitor, C of the input RC section. The other
advantages of our design over conventional OPAMP based LPF are

(1) a single power supply is required,

(2) CMRR, PSRR, slew rate are better.

(3) noise margin is high,

(4) design is very simple,

(5) fabrication cost is reduced greatly.

9.REFERENCES

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and Systems, 1989, pp. 1247–1266.

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modeel generation for analog and rf ic design,” in IEEE Transactions on
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