ADI Expands offering with Lowest Power Digital Isolators

Analog Devices, Inc. (ADI) has added the ADuM144x family, the industry's lowest power digital isolators. Based on ADI's proprietary iCoupler technology, the ADuM144x can be powered by as little as 1 µW of power, delivering power levels over 1,000 times lower than optocouplers and competing digital isolators. At these levels the ADuM144x family is ideally suited for industrial and instrumentation systems such as 4-20 mA current loops, remote sensors and green systems that demand high energy efficiency or depend on limited power sources, such as batteries.

The ADuM144x are quad-channel data isolators available in three different channel configurations with a one-minute isolation safety rating of 2.5 kV rms. They have an operating voltage range of 2.25 V to 3.6 V, further reducing power constraints and providing the lowest isolator operating voltage on the market. Quiescent power supply current at 2.5 V is less than 5 μA per channel, and power supply current at 2 Mbps is less than 380 μA per channel. A power saving mode can reduce current levels to as little as 0.1 μA per channel, resulting in an industry-best 1 μW of total power for the entire isolator. In addition to the significant power savings, the ADuM144x is also available in a 16-lead QSOP package, making it the industry’s smallest quad-channel digital isolators with a 2.5 kV rms isolation rating.

“The ADuM144x is a natural extension of our iCoupler digital isolator product family which includes the highest performance, most reliable isolators on the market. With the industry’s increased focus on energy efficiency, we recognized that our core iCoupler technology was the only isolation technology on the market capable of achieving such low power levels. We worked with customers to define this breakthrough product family and enhance our capabilities to serve their system needs,” said David Krakauer, product line manager of Analog Devices’ isolation and interface product line.

The ADuM144x family employs the same iCoupler chip-scale transformer technology used in ADI’s full line of safety isolation products and used in the more than one billion channels of isolation shipped in over ten years. The ADuM144x in the 16-lead QSOP package is in production and available today with versions in different packages, channel counts and higher isolation ratings forthcoming. In a 4 mm x 5 mm, 16-lead QSOP, the unit cost is $1.98. In January, an optional 7.2 mm x 5.3 mm, 20-lead SSOP package will be available for a unit cost of $2.48.