2402 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 54, NO.
6, DECEMBER 2005
Novel RC Sinusoidal Oscillator Using
Second-Generation Current Conveyor
Anwar A. Khan, Senior Member, IEEE, Sadanand Bimal, K. K. Dey, and S. S. Roy
AbstractA novel second-generation current conveyor (CCII)-
based resistancecapacitance (RC) sinusoidal oscillator operating
over a wide dynamic range is described. The oscillation condition
and the oscillation frequency can be adjusted independently by two
control resistors. The circuit proposed makes use of grounded ca-
pacitors and is suitable for implementation with the commercially
available integrated circuit chip AD844 from Analog Devices which
+
implements a CCII . The circuit enjoys low sensitivities and is
suitable for integration. Experimental results are given, showing
close agreement with the theoretical conclusions.
Index TermsAD844 applications, current conveyor, current
conveyor applications, current-mode sinusoidal oscillator, RC
circuits, single-resistance controlled oscillator.
I. INTRODUCTION
S INUSOIDAL oscillators of variable frequency find exten-
sive applications in communication systems, instrumen-
tation, and measurement. Voltage-mode operational amplifier
(op-amp)-based circuits have been shown to be very well
suited for the generation of sinusoidal waveforms incorporating
resistancecapacitance (RC) networks [1][4]. The simplicity
in the design approach turns into a disadvantage when it is
desired to change the frequency of oscillation independent
of the necessary and sufficient condition required to sustain
the oscillations. Moreover, the dynamic range of operation is
dictated by the frequency-dependent gain of op-amp [5]. The
composite op-amp configurations are then used to overcome
the shortcomings of one op-amp-based oscillators [6][8].
The OTA-C-based circuits [9], [10] and the current feedback
amplifier (CFB opamp)-based circuits [11], [12] have been
shown to offer improved performance over the conventional
op-amp-based oscillators. In recent years the current-mode
approach of signal processing has provided elegant solutions
for analogue circuit problems [13], [14]. The main advantages
that this mode of operation exhibits are wide bandwidth, high
slew rate and the fact that the gain can be realized independent
of a constant gain-bandwidth product constraint.
The second-generation current conveyor (CCII) is sometimes
claimed as the standard building block of the current mode op-
eration which stems largely from the fact that the CCII offers
a useful way of realizing complex circuit functions [15], [16].
Manuscript received June 13, 2004; revised July 26,2005. This work was sup-
ported by the University Grants Commission of India.
A. A. Khan, K. K. Dey, and S. S. Roy are with the Electronics Laboratory,
University Department of Physics, Ranchi University, Ranchi-834008, India
(e-mail: khananwar@sancharnet.in).
S. Bimal is with the Department of Physics, Birsa Institute of Technology,
Sindri-828123, India.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TIM.2005.859141
0018-9456/$20.00 2005 IEEE
+
Fig. 1. Symbol for second-generation current conveyor (CCII ).
Fig. 1 shows the symbol of a CCII [15] whose terminal charac-
teristics can be defined by a hybrid matrix giving the output of
the three ports in terms of their corresponding inputs [15], being
given by
(1)
The output current , thus, depends only on the input current
at terminal X (Fig. 1) which may be injected directly at X,
or it may be produced by the copy of the input voltage , from
terminal Y, acting across the impedance connected at X. The
sign in (1) indicates whether the conveyor is formulated as
an inverting or noninverting circuit, termed CCII or CCII .
By convention, positive is taken to mean and both flowing
simultaneously toward or away from the conveyor (Fig. 1).
The use of second-generation current conveyors, CCII or
CCII , for the design of RC sinusoidal oscillator circuits has
been demonstrated to be potentially advantageous in regard to
dynamic range of operation and the overall operational stability
[17]. In recent years, their applications and advantages in the
synthesis of RC sinusoidal oscillators with the salient features
of controlling the frequency of oscillation without affecting the
condition for oscillation [18][24] have received considerable
attention. In the absence of a commercially available integrated
circuit current conveyor RC sinusoidal oscillator configurations
reported earlier were tested in the laboratory, employing current
conveyor features implemented using op-amps with current mir-
rors [25][29].
An integrated circuit that implements the salient features of
CCII is commercially available. The AD844 from Analog De-
vices is such a device [30] which is modeled as an ideal CCII
having a current gain of (CCII ), a unity gain buffer and
the parasitic input and output impedances [31], [32]. This is de-
picted in Fig. 2. The ideal CCII with a unity gain voltage-mode
buffer as shown under the dotted lines in Fig. 2 may be con-
veniently replaced by a more realistic circuit symbol for an
ideal AD844 which is shown in Fig. 3 with its parasitic com-
ponents. The AD844 (Fig. 3) has the distinct advantage over the
basic CCII (Fig. 1) in that in AD844 a low-output impedance
buf-fer exists between the Z and W nodes which allows the
KHAN et al.: NOVEL RC SINUSOIDAL OSCILLATOR USING SECOND-GENERATION CURRENT CONVEYOR 2403

documented in (2) and referring to the notations in Fig. 4, one

can write the network equations as

(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)

+
Fig. 2. IC AD844 represented in terms of ideal CCII , a unity gain buffer and (7)
parasitic elements.
(8)

where

(9)

(10)
Fig. 3. AD844 with parasitic elements.
with , where is the angular frequency in rad/s.
Manipulations involving (2) through (10) yield the character-
istic equation in the form

(11)

where

(12)

Fig. 4. Proposed sinusoidal oscillator circuit using Analog Devices IC AD844

(13)
with grounded capacitors.
Note that and in (11) are frequently referred to as the
voltage at Z to be accessed without loading the transfer function. attenuation and the natural angular frequency, respectively. For
The terminal characteristic equations describing the behavior of the sake of convenience let us select the circuit components such
AD844 may, thus, be conveniently put in the form as that and . Substituting this
selection in (12) and (13), one gets
(2)
(14)
It may be seen that the voltage at the terminal W tracks the
voltage at the current-mode terminal Z. The typical values of
the parasitic components of the IC AD844, as shown in Fig. 3,
are M M pF, and (15)
pF.
The AD844 as a CCII with a unity gain buffer has been re- The roots and of (11) are seen to be
cently used for the realization of Wien bridge oscillator [31],
(16)
multiphase sinusoidal oscillator [33], [34], precision rectifica-
tion [35], and instrumentation amplifier [36]. In this paper a cir- For sustained oscillation, from (16), one may infer that must
cuit configuration for generating sinusoidal voltage waveform be zero. Thus, from (14) we get
employing AD844 and RC networks with grounded capacitors
is described. Analysis demonstrates the possibility of realizing (17)
frequency control independent of the condition required for the
maintenance of oscillations which is not affected by the para- Putting (17) in (15) yields
sitic impedances in contrast to that reported in [24]. Simulation
and the experimental results are presented and discussed. (18)

II. CIRCUIT DESCRIPTION AND ANALYSIS where is the angular frequency in rad/s for and is
The proposed RC sinusoidal oscillator using AD844 config- defined as
ured as CCII with grounded capacitors is depicted in Fig. 4.
Assuming the ideal terminal characteristics of the AD844 as (19)
2404 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 54, NO. 6, DECEMBER 2005

Further, for oscillations to grow, from (16) it may be seen that

must be negative and hence from (14) one gets

(20)
The oscillations, on the other hand, will die out when
. From (17) and (18) it may be seen that the frequency of os-
cillations can be controlled by the grounded resistor without
affecting the condition of oscillations. The value of should,
however, be kept less than or equal to .
However for a practical CCII embodied in AD844 the ter-
minal properties are conveniently described by
Fig. 5. Simulation results showing growth and sustained oscillations at 189.47
(21) kHz for R = R = R = 8:2 k
; C = C = C = 100 pF, R = 8:2 k

(22) 1
under the condition R = 3:8 k
(<" (R=2) R ). 0
where is a finite current tracking error at the high impedance
output node Z with respect to the low impedance node X and Thus, using (13) and (29), the -sensitivities for the circuit
is the finite voltage tracking error at the low impedance X in Fig. 3 with respect to , and for
from the high input impedance node Y. A routine analysis of and , may be computed from
the circuit in Fig. 4, taking into account the tracking errors as
expressed in (21) and (22) together with the parasitic elements
depicted in Fig. 4, yields expressions for the condition and fre-
quency of oscillations in the form (30)

(23)

(24)
It may be easily seen that for
where and

(25) III. SIMULATION AND EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS

(26)
The proposed circuit as depicted in Fig. 4 with V voltage
provided frequency determining elements (R and C) are selected supply was simulated with the PSPICE program for
such that and . It may be k pF, k ,
pointed out here that the tracking errors and for the AD844 and k . The model parameters
are in the order of 0.02 but they increase significantly with of AD844 used for PSPICE simulation were taken from the
and approaching , where is the dc voltage built-in library (AD844A/AD). The output voltage with time
supply to AD844. Assuming both the AD844 in Fig. 4 to be at frequency 189.472 kHz is shown in Fig. 5 with its frequency
identical ( , and in spectrum in Fig. 6 giving total harmonic distortion (THD) in the
(23) and (24), respectively, may be simplified to yield order of 1.5%. The stabilization of the amplitude of oscillations
at is clearly demonstrated. The circuit re-
(27)
sponse for k which is greater than
(28) is shown in Fig. 7. The circuit proposed in Fig. 4 was also im-
plemented in the laboratory using the popular IC AD844 from
Note that appearing in (23) and (24) are the resistance as-
Analog Devices with the components used in simulation and
sociated with the low impedance node X of the AD844 (Fig. 3)
with V voltage supply. The experimental results confirm
which is around 50 . The numerals attached with and
the simulated and theoretical results.
stand for the conveyors 1 and 2, respectively. Further it is to be
Fig. 8 shows the normalized oscillation frequency as
noted that for approaching in (24) ap-
a function of for pF and
proximately remains constant while in (23) decreases with
k as obtained experimentally. Also shown in
increasing . To start the oscillations, is kept slightly less
Fig. 8 (solid line) are the data computed using (24) as a function
than which results in allowing the amplitude of
of . A good agreement of the theoretical analysis with the
oscillations to grow until it reaches beyond which
experimental results is evident. Also, it may be seen that can
decreases and as a result the condition of sustained oscilla-
be conveniently used for the variation in frequency over a factor
tions in (23) is satisfied and maintained.
of 100 for a typical setting of C without affecting the condition
The -sensitivities with the element of variation F may be
of oscillation. If one desires to keep the value of fixed, C can
defined as
be conveniently chosen for the desired frequency range and
then need to be varied to get variation in frequency. Care should,
(29)
however, be taken to see that the value of C should be large
KHAN et al.: NOVEL RC SINUSOIDAL OSCILLATOR USING SECOND-GENERATION CURRENT CONVEYOR 2405

Fig. 6. Frequency spectrum of the waveform in Fig. 5.

Fig. 7. Simulation results showing decay of oscillations at 189.47 kHz for R
; C = C = C = 100 pF, R = 8:2 k
under the
condition R = 4:0 k
being greater than (" (R=2) R ).
= R = R = 8:2 k
1
0
IV. CONCLUSION
A new topology for the variable frequency sinusoidal oscil-
lation using IC AD844 with grounded capacitors is presented.
The proposed circuit allows independent control of the oscil-
lation condition and oscillation frequency. The oscillation fre-
quency is controlled with a single grounded resistance which in
turn allows digital control of the frequency if weighted resistors
are used. It is shown that the experimental results conform well
with the simulation and theoretical conclusions.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors are grateful to the University Grants Commis-
sion, New Delhi, for the financial support of the Research
Project and also to the IEEE organizations for providing facili-
ties to its members to use IEEE Xplore on Web.

REFERENCES
[1] A. Budak and K. Nay, Operational amplifier circuits for the Wien-
Fig. 8.Variation of normalized oscillation frequency ((!=! ) ) with Bridge oscillator, IEEE Trans. Circuits. Syst., vol. CAS-28, no. 9, pp.
(2R=R 0 1) for C = C = C = 100 pF and R = R = R = 8:2k
930934, Sep. 1981.
with R < (" 1 (R=2): 0 R ). [2] A. Boutin, Two-new single op-amp RC bridge-T oscillator circuits, in
Proc. IEEE, vol. 130, Oct. 1983, pp. 222224.
[3] T. S. Rathore and B. B. Bhattacharyya, Minimal realization of RC-os-
enough to minimize the effect of , the parasitic capacitance cillatoraA synthesis approach, J. Inst. Electron. Telecommun. Eng.,
at node Z of the AD844. vol. 32, no. 6, pp. 435437, 1986.
2406 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 54, NO. 6, DECEMBER 2005
[4] J. V. Vosper, The Wien Bridge oscillator incorporating an op-amp as the
active element, Int. J. Elect. Engg. Educ., vol. 25, pp. 125139, 1988.
[5] A. Carlosena, P. Martinez, and S. Porta, An improved Wien bridge os-
cillator, IEEE Trans. Circuits. Syst., vol. 37, no. 4, pp. 543546, Apr.
1990.
[6] A. Rodriguez-Vazquez, J. L. Huertas, and B. Perez-Verdue, High fre-
quency design of the Wien-Bridge oscillator using composite ampli-
fiers, IEEE Trans. Circuits. Syst., vol. CAS-34, no. 4, pp. 441443, Apr
1987.
[7] S. S. Awad, Extending the frequency range of a Wien-Bridge oscillator
using composite operational amplifiers, IEEE Trans. Instrum. Meas.,
vol. 38, no. 3, pp. 740744, Jun 1989.
[8] A. Carlosena, P. Martinez, and S. Porta, Wien-Bridge oscillator with
opamp independent oscillation frequency, IEEE Trans. Instrum. Meas.,
vol. 40, no. 3, pp. 644646, Jun 1991.
[9] B. Linares-Barranco, A. Rodriguez-Vazquez, E. Sanchez-Sinecio, and
J. L. Huertas, 10 MHz CMOS OTA-C voltage-controlled quadrature
oscillator, Electron. Lett., vol. 25, pp. 765766, 1989.
[10] , CMOS OTA-C high-frequency sinusoidal oscillators, IEEE J.
Solid-Stae Circuits, vol. 26, no. 2, pp. 160165, Feb. 1991.
[11] S. Celma, P. A. Martinez, and A. Carlosena, Current feedback ampli-
fier-based sinusoidal oscillators, IEEE Trans. Circuits. Syst. I: Fundam.
Theory Applicat., vol. 41, no. 12, pp. 906908, Dec. 1994.
[12] R. Senani and V. K. Singh, Novel single-resistance controlled-oscillator
configuration using current feedback amplifiers, IEEE Trans. Circuits.
Syst. I: Fundam. Theory Applicat., vol. 43, no. 8, pp. 698700, 1996.
[13] A. S. Sedra, G. W. Roberts, and F. Gohn, The current conveyor: History,
progress and new results, Proc. Inst. Electr. Eng., pt. G, vol. 137, pp.
7887, 1990.
[14] C. Toumazou, F. J. Lidgey, and D. G. Haigh, Eds., Analogue IC Design:
The current-mode approach. London, U.K.: Peter Peregrinus, 1990.
[15] B. Wilson, Recent developments in current conveyors and cur-
rent-mode circuits, Inst. Electr. Eng. Proc., pt. G, vol. 137, no. 2, pp.
6377, 1990.
[16] S. Celma, A. Carlosena, and P. A. Martinez, Systematic generation of
canonic RC-active oscillators using CCII, in Proc. ECCTD93- Circuit
Theory and Design, 1993, pp. 15091514.
[17] R. Nandi, Wien Bridge oscillators using current conveyors, Proc.
IEEE, vol. 65, no. 11, pp. 16081609, Nov. 1977.
[18] R. Senani, New canonic single-resistance-controlled sinusoidal oscil-
lator using a single current conveyor, Electron. Lett., vol. 15, no. 18, pp.
568569, 1979.
[19] R. Senani and V. K. Singh, Single-element-controlled sinusoidal oscil-
lator employing single current conveyor IC, Electron. Lett., vol. 28, no.
4, pp. 414415, 1992.
[20] S. Celma, P. A. Martinez, and A. Carlosena, Minimal realization for
single resistor controlled sinusoidal oscillator using single CCII, Elec-
tron. Lett., vol. 28, no. 5, pp. 443444, 1992.
[21] D. R. Bhaskar and R. Senani, New current conveyor based single-resis-
tance-controlled/voltage-controlled oscillator employing grounded ca-
pacitors, Electron. Lett., vol. 29, no. 7, pp. 612613, 1993.
[22] C. M. Chang, Novel current-conveyor based single-resistance-con-
trolled/voltage-controlled oscillator employing grounded resistors and
capacitors, Electron. Lett., vol. 30, no. 3, pp. 181183, 1994.
[23] S. I. Lin, Single-resistance-controlled/voltage-controlled oscillator
using current conveyors and grounded capacitors, Electron. Lett., vol.
31, no. 5, pp. 337338, 1995.
[24] P. A. Martinez and J. Sabadell, Variable frequency sinusoidal oscilla-
+
tors based on CCII , IEEE Trans. Circuits Syst. I: Fundam. Theory
Applicat., vol. 46, no. 11, pp. 13861390, 1999.
[25] J. L. Huertas, Circuit implementation of current conveyors, Electron.
Lett., vol. 16, pp. 225226, 1980.
[26] M. Sharif-Bakhtiar and P. Aronhime, A current conveyor realization
using operational amplifiers, Int. J. Electron., vol. 45, pp. 283288,
1978.
[27] R. Senani, Novel circuit implementation of current conveyors using an
OA and an OTA, Electron. Lett., vol. 16, no. 1, pp. 23, 1980.
[28] J. L. Huertas, Circuit implementation of current conveyor, Electron.
Lett., vol. 16, no. 6, pp. 225226, 1980.
[29] B. Wilson, High-performance current conveyor implementation, Elec-
tron. Lett., vol. 20, pp. 990991, 1986.
[30] AD844 Data Sheet (1992).
[31] J. A. Svoboda, L. McGory, and S. Webb, Applications of A commer-
cially available current conveyor, Int. J. Electron., vol. 70, no. 1, pp.
159164, 1991.
[32] L. Wan and S. Natrajan, Experimental verification of variable gain
CCII-K circuits and modeling of AD844, in Proc. 29th Southeastern
Conf. System Theory, 1997, pp. 168172.
[33] C.-L. Hon and B. Shen, Second-generation current conveyor-based
multiphase sinusoidal oscillators, Int. J. Electron., vol. 78, no. 2, pp.
317325, 1995.
[34] D.-S. Wu, S.-I. Liu, Y.-S. Hwang, and Y.-P. Wu, Multiphase soscillator
using second-generation current conveyors, Int. J. Electron., vol. 78,
no. 4, pp. 645651, 1995.
[35] A. A. Khan, M. A. El-Ela, and M. A. Al-Turaigi, Current-mode preci-
sion rectification, Int. J. Electron., vol. 79, no. 6, pp. 853859, 1995.
[36] A. A. Khan, M. A. Al-Turaigi, and M. A. El-Ela, An improved current-
mode instrumentation amplifier with bandwidth independent of gain,
IEEE Trans. Instrum. Meas., vol. 44, no. 4, pp. 887891, Aug. 1995.
Anwar A. Khan (SM85) was born in India. He received the M.Sc. degree in
physics with electronics from Patna University, Patna, India, in 1968 and the
Ph.D. degree in electronics in 1977 from Magadh University, Bodh-Gaya, India.
He worked as a Lecturer in electronics from 1969 to 1978 in the Post-Grad-
uate Department of Physics, Magadh University, Bodh-Gaya, India. In 1978, he
joined Post-Graduate Department of Physics, Ranchi University, Ranchi, India
as a Reader in electronics and was promoted to Full University Professor in
1985. From 1983 to 1988 and 1990 to 1995, he was on the faculty of Electrical
Engineering Department at King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, being
on leave from Ranchi University, Ranchi. His teaching and research interests
include electrical sensors and devices, switched-capacitor network, analog/dig-
ital electronics, instrumentation and measurement, computer-aided design of
electronic circuits and systems, and current-mode circuits. He has authored and
coauthored over 72 scientific papers in the refereed journals of international re-
pute.
Prof. Khan is a Fellow of the Institution of Electronics and Telecommunica-
tion Engineers, India. Currently, he is Pro-Vice Chancellor of Ranchi University,
Ranchi, India.
Sadanand Bimal was born in India in 1965. He received the B.Sc.(Hons.),
M.Sc. degrees in physics from Ranchi University, Ranchi, India, in 1981 and
1984, respectively, and the Ph.D. degree in electronics from Ranchi University,
Ranchi, India, in 2003.
He has been an Assistant Professor of physics at Birsa Institute of Technology,
formerly Bihar Institute of Technology, Sindri, India, since 1986. His current
research interests include current-mode instrumentation. He has coauthored five
papers in the journals of international repute.
K. K. Dey was born in India. He received B.Sc. (Hons.), M.Sc., and Ph.D. de-
grees in physics in 1962, 1964, and 1983, respectively, all from Ranchi Univer-
sity, Ranchi, India.
Currently, he is working as a Professor in the Post-Graduate Department of
Physics, Ranchi University, Ranchi, India. He has several papers in the reputed
national journals in the field of microwave engineering.
Dr. Dey is a Fellow of the Institution of Electronics and Telecommunication
Engineers, India, and a Life Member of the Instrument Society of India.
S. S. Roy was born in India. He received the B.Sc. (Hons.), M.Sc., and Ph.D.
degrees in physics from Ranchi University, Ranchi, India, in 1963, 1965, and
1977, respectively. He has been a Teacher at Ranchi University, Ranchi, India,
since 1965 and a Professor at the same university since 1990. He authored a
number of original research papers/articles in various journals/magazines.
Dr. Roy is a Fellow of the Institution of Electronics and Telecommunica-
tion Engineers, India, and a life member of the Instrument Society of India. His
present research activities are on the development of current-mode circuits.