A Low Cost Discrete Digital Isolator Circuit

Tom Conway

doi:10.48550/arXiv.2603.24096

A Low Cost Discrete Digital Isolator Circuit

Tom Conway

Department of Electronics & Computer Engineering

Research output: Other contribution

Abstract

This work presents a fully discrete, low cost digital isolator requiring no specialized ICs and implemented entirely with general purpose transistors and a two layer PCB embedded air core transformer. The design avoids vendor lock in and long term component obsolescence risks, while providing >1 kV isolation, ~200 ns propagation delay, and validated NRZ data rates of 1 Mbps. A modified dual oscillator architecture enables inherent hardware lockout suitable for half bridge gate driver applications. Measured performance and PCB layout guidelines are provided.

Original language	American English
Type	Paper presenting a novel discrete circuit implementation of a practical digital isolation system
Media of output	arXiv
Publisher	arXiv open‑access repository
Number of pages	5
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2603.24096
Publication status	Published - 26 Mar 2026

Publication series

Name	ArXiv
Publisher	ArXiv.org
ISSN (Electronic)	2331-8422

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

SDG 7 Affordable and Clean Energy
SDG 9 Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure

Keywords

Galvanic Isolation, PCB Air Core Transformer, Discrete Circuit Implementation

Access to Document

10.48550/arXiv.2603.24096Licence: CC BY

Cite this

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title = "A Low Cost Discrete Digital Isolator Circuit",

abstract = "This work presents a fully discrete, low cost digital isolator requiring no specialized ICs and implemented entirely with general purpose transistors and a two layer PCB embedded air core transformer. The design avoids vendor lock in and long term component obsolescence risks, while providing >1 kV isolation, \textasciitilde{}200 ns propagation delay, and validated NRZ data rates of 1 Mbps. A modified dual oscillator architecture enables inherent hardware lockout suitable for half bridge gate driver applications. Measured performance and PCB layout guidelines are provided.",

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AB - This work presents a fully discrete, low cost digital isolator requiring no specialized ICs and implemented entirely with general purpose transistors and a two layer PCB embedded air core transformer. The design avoids vendor lock in and long term component obsolescence risks, while providing >1 kV isolation, ~200 ns propagation delay, and validated NRZ data rates of 1 Mbps. A modified dual oscillator architecture enables inherent hardware lockout suitable for half bridge gate driver applications. Measured performance and PCB layout guidelines are provided.

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A Low Cost Discrete Digital Isolator Circuit

Abstract

Publication series

UN SDGs

Keywords

Access to Document

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