ABSTRACT
This chapter presents a survey of integrated circuit techniques, from model formulation to silicon design, for the monolithic implementation of chaos-based random signal generators. Two examples of physical random signal generation techniques are direct noise amplification and phase noise sampling. In the first case, a high gain amplifier is used to amplify the small ac voltage produced by a thermal or shot noise source. The second approach for physical random signal generation exploits the frequency instability, or jitter, of free-running oscillators-a by-product of transistor thermal noise - as the fundamental source of randomness. The simplest transconductor is just one transistor acting as a voltage-controlled current source. However, a single transistor has terminal impedances and linearity which are far from ideal. The chapter shows the experimental results obtained from two monolithic chaotic circuits, which confirm the possibility to generate chaotic behaviors on-chip in a robust and controlled manner.
