MOS Only Simulated Grounded Negative Resistors

Abdullah Sunca, Oguzhan Cicekoglu, and Gunhan Dundar

AbstractIn this paper, a number of tunable grounded

negative resistor circuits are presented. These new negative
resistors exhibit important features such as simplicity,
independent tunability and wide frequency range. One of the
introduced negative resistor circuits is simulated using TSMC
0.18m process parameters and compared to a couple of other
negative resistors in the literature.
KeywordsMOS, resistance simulation, negative resistor,
tunable resistor, active resistor.

I. INTRODUCTION

ECENTLY, there has been a growing interest in the

realization of active resistors, both positive and negative,
appropriate for on-chip fabrication. Not only positivevalued tunable resistors but also negative-valued resistors are
increasingly being needed as a key element for the
implementation of filters, oscillators, amplifiers, mixers,
artificial neural networks and control systems [1-3].
Negative resistor implementations started with the
discovery of tunnel diode and continued with more and more
improved circuits in the literature [4-8]. Negative resistors
were mostly preferred as negative resistance loads (NRL)
within these filter implementations for the compensation of
parasitic resistances. In the following years, a number of
floating and grounded resistance circuits have been
introduced and utilized in RF bandpass filter applications [913]. In the last few years new techniques have been proposed
for the implementation of traditional cross-coupled transistor
pairs forming negative resistance [14-17]. In most of the
reported topologies in the literature coupling of negative
resistance to the main circuit appears as a problem, especially
for floating negative resistors. As the negative loads are
designed within the circuits, their bias currents and other
parameters inevitably affect the main circuit parameters and
additional adjustment may be needed. A number of examples
concerning this issue can bee seen in [8,9,13,14]. As a
classical approach for implementing a negative resistor,
cross-coupled transistor pairs are arranged in grounded
topology in [14] and main drawback here is the reusage of the
current between negative resistance load and active inductor,
which affects the circuit parameters. Isolation between the
negative resistance load and the main circuit is important with
the fact that parasitic input capacitance and biasing issues
directly change the behavior of the main circuit. This need is
fulfilled in [15] by applying ac coupling for the separation of

Manuscript received May 5, 2011

A. Sunca is MS student at the Dept. of Electrical & Electronics Engg
Bogazici University Istanbul/TURKEY
(e-mail: abdullahsunca@hotmail.com )
O. Cicekoglu and G.Dundar are with the Dept. of Electrical &
Electronics Engg Bogazici University Istanbul/TURKEY
(e-mail: cicekogl@boun.edu.tr, gunhan.dundar@boun.edu.tr )

978-1-4577-1411-5/11/$26.00 2011 IEEE

the negative resistance load, which is a slight modification of

the negative resistor topology used in [14].
In this paper, we present a number of grounded negative
resistor circuits, all having different equations of resistance
and these circuits are to be ac coupled to the main circuit.
Different from the topology in [15], proposed negative
resistors are easier to bias and tune. In addition they have less
number of transistors including bias circuitry. Minimum
dimensions can be used for the transistors to keep the power
consumption and input parasitic capacitance low. One of the
proposed negative resistor circuits is examined and compared
to that of a grounded negative resistor in [8] and floating
negative resistor in [7] by using the simulation results
obtained in [18]. In addition, a general comparison is made
regarding the usage of the proposed negative resistors among
other proposed negative resistor circuits in the literature.
II. CIRCUIT PRINCIPLE
Negative resistors are well-investigated in the aspects of
large and small signal characteristics including noise, stability
and bandwidth by [18]. Although negative resistors are
potentially unstable, their usage for compensation of parasitic
resistances makes them stable in higher level circuits.
Twelve negative resistance simulators are shown in Table
III. Each pair of them realizes the same input resistance as
shown in the table. Note that they are topologically related in
pairs.
The gate-source capacitance of the MOS transistors may
introduce additional poles and zeros to the input impedance
function that may deteriorate the functionality of the circuit.
To illustrate this we examined the negative resistance
simulator (b) in Table III considering the gate-source
capacitances and drain-source conductances as a source of the
non-ideality effect. The circuit is repeated in Fig.1 for
convenience. Its non-ideal input impedance is given as:
ZIN =

gm1 +gm2 +gm3 +go1 +go2 +go3 +s( C1 +C2 +C3)

2
gm1gm2 +gm3go1 +go2go1 +go3go1 +s( gm3C2 +go2C2 +go3C2 +go1C3 +go1C1) +sC
2 ( C3 +C1)

(1)

where gmi is the transconductance, Ci is the parasitic gatesource capacitance of Mi and goi is the drain-source
conductance of Mi. Neglecting drain-source conductances,
resistance at low frequencies is given as:
R eq =

g m1 + g m2 + g m3
g m1g m2

(2)

Note that the input impedance equation has a second order

denominator and it has a zero at:

z =

g m1 + g m 2 + g m 3 + g o1 + g o 2 + g o 3
C1 + C2 + C3

(3)

which implies one condition for desired operation as < z.

328

TSP 2011

VDD

VDD

VDD

J1
Magnitude(abs)

Vb=0.9V

Vb=0.95V
Vb=1.2V
Vb=1.5V

J2

Vb=1.3V

Fig.1. Proposed negative resistor

Frequency (Hz)

Complete schematic of the negative resistor circuit is

shown in Fig.2. Resistance can be tuned changing gm1 after
adjusting gm2 and gm3.

(a)

Vb=0.9V

Vd

VDD

VDD

M5
M2

M3

Vb=0.95V

Phase (degrees)

VDD

Vc

Vb=1.2V
Vb=1.3V
Vb=1.5V

ZIN

Vb

M1
Frequency (Hz)

Va

(b)
Fig.3. (a) Magnitude of input impedance of the negative resistor, (b) phase of
input impedance of the negative resistor

M4

TABLE I

Fig.2. Complete negative resistor circuit

COMPARISON OF FREQUENCY AND PHASE RELATIONS

III. SIMULATION RESULTS

Negative resistor behavior is investigated through
frequency range and phase response. Magnitude and phase of
the input impedance of the proposed negative resistor circuit
is shown Fig.3.
In contrast to that of a grounded negative resistor in [8],
frequency range in which the pure resistor behavior is
observed (-180 degrees phase shift) shows a better transition.
Table I shows a comparison about frequency and phase
relations between these two negative resistors. Other large
and small signal parameters for [8] and [7] are compared in
Table II. It is seen that proposed negative resistor circuit
serves a more appropriate solution concerning frequency
response and loading effects. For tuning possibilities,
negative resistor in [8] is the best although its operation is
limited up to 4 MHz.

329

Design
(for -10K)
[8]
This work

Phase angle (degrees) at specified frequency

100 kHz

500 kHz

16 MHz

300 MHz

1GHz

-180
-180

-180
-180

-155
-180

-70
-172

-60
-150

TABLE II
COMPARISON OF LARGE & SMALL SIGNAL PARAMETERS
Performance
Technology
Power Supply
Tuning Range
Power
Consumption
Constant
Resistance Range

[8]
0.5
1.5 V
-8K to -250K
0.37mW
(R=-20K)

[7]
1.2
3V
-8K to -11K
0.96mW
(R=-10K)

This work
0.18
1.5 V
-2K to -11K
0.42mW
(R=-10K)

0~4 MHz

0~300 MHz

0~900 MHz

TABLE III
PROPOSED CIRCUITS
CIRCUITS
Type1

EQUIVALENT RESISTANCE

Type2
VDD

VDD

VDD

M2

ZIN
Va

(a)

M1

M3

R eq =

M2

ZIN

VDD

Va

M3

VDD

VDD

VDD

VDD
Vb

M3

M2

ZIN

(b)

Va

M1

ZIN
Va

M1

M2

M1

Req =

VDD
M1

VDD

VDD
Va

ZIN

M3

M2
M3

Req =

(c)
ZIN

Va

M2

M2

Va
ZIN

g m1
g m2 g m3

VDD
ZIN

M3

(d)

M1

VDD

VDD

g m1 + g m 2 + g m 3
g m1 g m 2

Vb

M3

VDD

g m3
g m1 g m 2

M1

Va
M2

M1
M3

330

Req =

g m1 g m 3

g m3
g m 2 g m1 + g m 2 g m 3

CIRCUITS
Type1
VDD
Va

EQUIVALENT RESISTANCE

Type2
VDD
M2

M4

ZIN
Vb

(e)

VDD

M1

Va

M3

M4

R eq =

M2

ZIN

VDD
Va

Vb

M3

VDD

VDD

M3

ZIN

(f)

Vb

M1

M2
M1

Va

M1

ZIN
Vb

M2
M3

[8]

IV. CONCLUSIONS
In this work a number of MOS negative resistor circuits
are introduced. Large and small signal characteristics and
frequency response comparisons show that these new
resistors can be utilized in many applications requiring
resistance compensation. These resistor circuits are
competitive among other implementations in the literature
due to the advantages in tunability, frequency range,
simplicity, capacitive loading and biasing. In addition, these
circuits can be accepted as multi-purpose negative resistor
blocks and they are potential candidates to be utilized in
many implementations in communication systems.

[2]

[3]

[4]
[5]

[6]
[7]

[9]

[10]

[11]

[12]

[13]

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g m3
g m1 g m 2 + g m 3 g m 4

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