BRICD — Biomedical Research in Integrated Circuit Design BRICD — Biomedical Research in Integrated Circuit Design
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Where biomedical engineering meets IC design innovation

Biomedical Research in Integrated Circuit Design

BRICD is a research community of university undergraduates and academics finding ways to apply biomedical integrated circuit design to solve healthcare problems in the local community — built openly, on open-source PDKs and EDA flows.

Explore our projects View on GitHub
3
research projects
130nm
open PDKs
100%
open-source flow
About BRICD

An open community designing the silicon behind better healthcare.

We believe high-performance medical electronics shouldn't be locked behind proprietary tools. BRICD brings undergraduates and academics together to design biomedical integrated circuits entirely in the open.

From low-power data converters to RF transceivers and bio-sensing front-ends, our members take chips from concept through schematic, layout, verification and tape-out — using fully open-source PDKs and EDA flows so every result is reproducible.

Our work spans the Skywater 130nm and IHP SG13G2 BiCMOS processes, and includes the first RF integrated-circuit design paper from the Department of Electronic & Telecommunication Engineering, University of Moratuwa.

See what we're building →

Analog & Mixed-Signal

Data converters, references and low-power interfaces.

RF & Wireless

LC-VCOs, PLLs and transceiver blocks for 2.4 GHz radios.

Biomedical Sensing

Bio-impedance, ear-EEG and motion-artifact front-ends.

Open-Source Silicon

Xschem, Ngspice, OpenEMS, KLayout & OpenROAD.

Research Projects

Chips designed, simulated and taped out in the open.

Each project is a complete open-source design — schematics, layout, SPICE decks and verification all public.

SAR ADC — die micrograph drop chip photo / layout here
PROJECT 01

A 100 kSPS 8-bit Fully-Differential SAR ADC for Low-Power Applications

A compact successive-approximation register ADC designed for low-power biomedical data acquisition, implemented entirely in the open-source SkyWater 130 nm PDK with a fully differential signal path for improved noise and supply rejection.

SkyWater 130nm SAR Architecture Fully-Differential Open-Source EDA
8-bit
resolution
100 kSPS
sample rate
Diff.
signal path
130nm
SkyWater PDK
Project announcement
LC-VCO PLL — layout (0.347 mm²) drop layout / inductor render here
PROJECT 02

A 2.4 GHz LC-VCO Fractional-N Phase-Locked Loop in 130 nm BiCMOS

A type-II fractional-N PLL with a cross-coupled differential LC-VCO and a custom spiral inductor (4 nH, Q = 16.8) modelled in OpenEMS — the first fully open-source RF IC design demonstrating high-performance radios are achievable in the open CMOS ecosystem.

IHP SG13G2 130nm Fractional-N PLL Δ-Σ Modulation OpenEMS SMACD 2026
2.45 GHz
center freq
−100.8
dBc/Hz @ 1MHz
12.73 mW
DC power
0.347 mm²
chip area
Repository Read abstract
Ear-EEG ASIC — Tiny Tapeout tile drop GDS render / chip photo here
PROJECT 03

A CMOS ASIC for Electrode-Skin Impedance Measurement & Motion-Artifact Removal in Ear-EEG

A mixed-signal front-end that simultaneously measures electrode-skin impedance and removes motion artifacts for wearable ear-EEG platforms — submitted to the SkyWater 130 nm Tiny Tapeout 2025 (ttsky25) open shuttle as the "EpitaXC" tile.

SkyWater 130nm Tiny Tapeout ttsky25 Ear-EEG Bio-Impedance Motion-Artifact Removal
Ear-EEG
target platform
EIS
impedance sensing
MAR
artifact removal
130nm
SkyWater PDK
Repository
Publications

Peer-reviewed & open work.

SMACD
2026

A 2.4 GHz LC-VCO Fractional-N Phase-Locked Loop Open-Source Design in 130 nm BiCMOS

M. Thiriloganathan, S. Ranasinghe, A. Herath, R. Rameshkumar, H. Marasinghe, A. Viduranga · Supervised by K. Wickremasinghe & G. Leelarathne · Dept. of Electronic & Telecommunication Engineering, University of Moratuwa

Accepted · Dresden, DE
Open Project
2024

A 100 kSPS 8-bit Fully-Differential SAR ADC for Low-Power Applications in 130 nm SkyWater PDK

BRICD research group · Open-source design & verification in the SkyWater 130 nm PDK

Open-source
Tiny Tapeout
2025

EpitaXC — A CMOS ASIC for Electrode-Skin Impedance Measurement & Motion-Artifact Removal in Ear-EEG

L. Atapattu · BRICD research group · SkyWater 130 nm Tiny Tapeout 2025 (ttsky25) shuttle

Tape-out
Team & Members

The people behind the silicon.

A growing community of undergraduates and academics. Drop in real photos to replace the placeholders.

KW// photo

Kithmin Wickremasinghe

FOUNDER · ADVISOR (MASc)

Leads and supervises BRICD's research efforts, mentoring undergraduates through the full open-source IC design flow — from architecture to tape-out.

AH// photo

Avishka Herath

RESEARCHER · RF / MIXED-SIGNAL

Core contributor to BRICD's RF and mixed-signal work, including the 2.4 GHz fractional-N PLL accepted at SMACD 2026.

Researchers & Contributors

News

Latest from the group.

2026

PLL paper accepted at SMACD 2026

Our 2.4 GHz fractional-N PLL has been accepted for publication at SMACD 2026 in Dresden, Germany — the first RF IC design paper from ENTC, University of Moratuwa.

Research
2025

Ear-EEG ASIC submitted to Tiny Tapeout

The "EpitaXC" front-end for electrode-skin impedance measurement and motion-artifact removal joined the SkyWater 130 nm Tiny Tapeout 2025 open shuttle.

Tape-out
2024

Fully-differential SAR ADC released

An 8-bit, 100 kSPS fully-differential SAR ADC for low-power applications, designed end-to-end in the open-source SkyWater 130 nm PDK.

Project
Open Source

Every chip, fully reproducible.

We design exclusively with open-source PDKs and EDA tools — Xschem, Ngspice, OpenEMS, KLayout and OpenROAD — so anyone can inspect, simulate and build on our work. All our designs live on GitHub.

github.com/bricd-org Follow on LinkedIn
SG13G2_2.4GHz_LC_VCO_FPLL
2.4 GHz fractional-N PLL · IHP 130nm BiCMOS
RF
ttsky25_EpitaXC
Ear-EEG impedance & motion-artifact ASIC
Bio
bricd-org
All BRICD projects & resources
Org
Join Us

Want to design chips with us?

We welcome undergraduates, researchers and collaborators interested in open-source biomedical IC design. Reach out — tell us what you'd like to build.

LINKEDIN
@thebricd
GITHUB
github.com/bricd-org