A minaturized broad-band MMIC frequency doubler

A miniaturized broadband balanced MMIC (monolithic microwave integrated circuit) frequency double, composed of a common-gate FET and a common-source FET directly connected to each drain electrode, has been proposed and demonstrated. The doubler is designed and fabricated as a miniaturized function module using a conventional two-gate FET configuration, active trapping, and active impedance matching. The doubler design has been performed through phase error estimation, gate width optimization, and gate-source voltage optimization. The phase error estimation in a nonlinear condition has eliminated phase error compensation circuits. The fabricated chip size is only 0.5 mm×0.5 mm, which is about 1/10 the area of previously reported doublers. A conversion loss of 8-10 dB, a fundamental frequency suppression better than 17 dB, and an input return loss better than 8 dB are obtained in the output frequency range from 6 to 16 GHz. The broadband doubler as a miniaturized MMIC function module can be applicable to small-size oscillator MMICs and multifunction MMICs     

Dual-chip GaAs monolithic integration Ku-bandphase-locked-loop microwave synthesizer

Two novel multifunction monolithic chips, GaAs microwave monolithic integrated circuit (MMIC) and large-scale integration (LSI) chips, have been developed to realize an extremely small and lightweight microwave synthesizer. The MMIC includes a voltage-controlled oscillator, a dual-output buffer amplifier, a balun, and dynamic/static prescalers. To integrate these functions on a single chip, each circuit has been drastically reduced in size by utilizing a uniplanar MMIC configuration. The LSI includes a dual-modulus prescalar, programmable counters, and a phase/frequency comparator. By incorporating these two monolithic chips in the structure, a Ku-band microwave synthesizer has been fabricated in an 11-mm×23-mm flat package. The synthesizer to which these multifunction chips were applied had a tuning range broader than 1 GHz in the Ku-band with a flatness within 2 dB_pp. In spite of low-Q monolithic circuitry, single-sideband (SSB) phase noise was as low as -70 dBc/Hz     

A 108-GHz InP-HBT monolithic push-push VCO with low phase noise andwide tuning bandwidth

This paper reports on what is believed to be the highest frequency bipolar voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) so far reported. The W-band VCO is based on a push-push oscillator topology, which employs InP HBT technology with peak f_T's and f_max's of 75 and 200 GHz, respectively. The W-band VCO produces a maximum oscillating frequency of 108 GHz and delivers an output power of +0.92 dBm into 50 Ω. The VCO also obtains a tuning bandwidth of 2.73 GHz or 2.6% using a monolithic varactor. A phase noise of -88 dBc/Hz and -109 dBc/Hz is achieved at 1- and 10-MHz offsets, respectively, and is believed to be the lowest phase noise reported for a monolithic W-band VCO. The push-push VCO design approach demonstrated in this work enables higher VCO frequency operation, lower noise performance, and smaller size, which is attractive for millimeter-wave frequency source applications     

A Ka-band MMIC oscillator utilizing a labyrinthine PBG resonator

A Ka-band monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) oscillator was implemented by using a coplanar waveguide photonic bandgap (PBG) resonator and a 0.1-/spl mu/m GaAs pseudomorphic high electron mobility transistor. A coplanar labyrinthine one-dimensional PBG resonator was used for reduction in MMIC size. The fabricated MMIC oscillator had an output power of 6.5dBm at 30.3GHz and a free-running phase noise of -80dBc/Hz at 100-kHz offset.     

Balanced Colpitt oscillator MMICs designed for ultra-low phase noise

Balanced voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) monolithic microwave integrated circuits (MMICs) based on a coupled Colpitt topology with a fully integrated tank are presented utilizing SiGe heterojunction bipolar transistor (HBT) and InGaP/GaAs HBT technologies. Minimum phase noise is obtained for all designs by optimization of the tank circuit including the varactor, maximizing the tank amplitude, and designing the VCO for Class C operation. Fundamental and second harmonic VCOs are evaluated. A minimum phase noise of less than -112 dBc at an output power of 5.5 dBm is achieved at 100-kHz carrier offset and 6.4-GHz oscillation frequency for the fundamental InGaP/GaAs HBT VCO. The second harmonic VCO achieves a minimum measured phase noise of -120 dBc at 100 kHz at 13 GHz. To our best knowledge, this is the lowest reported phase noise to date for a varactor-based VCO with a fully integrated tank. The fundamental frequency SiGe HBT oscillator achieves a phase noise of -108 dBc at 100 kHz at 5 GHz. All MMICs are fabricated in commercial foundry MMIC processes.     

A fully integrated V-band PLL MMIC using 0.15-/spl mu/m GaAs pHEMT technology

A fully integrated V-band phase-locked loop (PLL) MMIC with good phase noise and low-power consumption is developed using 0.15-/spl mu/m GaAs pHEMTs. For V-band frequency division,a wideband divide-by-3 frequency divider is proposed using cascode FET-based harmonic injection locking. The fourth subharmonic mixer using anti-parallel diode pair is employed as a high-frequency phase detector. In this way, the required frequency of the reference oscillator is lowered to one twelfth of V-band output signal. An RC low-pass filter and DC amplifier are also integrated to effectively suppress the spurious and harmonic signals, and to increase the loop gain. To reduce the circuit interactions and frequency pulling effect, buffer amplifiers are used at the output of VCO and frequency divider. The fabricated V-band PLL MMIC shows the locking range of 840 MHz around 60.1GHz under a very low power dissipation of 370 mW. Good phase noise of -95.5 dBc/Hz is measured at 100 kHz offset. The chip size is as small as 2.35/spl times/1.80 mm/sup 2/. To the best of our knowledge, the PLL MMIC of this work is one of the highest frequency monolithic PLLs that integrates all the required elements on a single chip.     

A 25-GHz ultra-low phase noise InGaP/GaAs HBT VCO

A 25-GHz monolithic voltage controlled oscillator (VCO) has been designed and fabricated in a commercial InGaP/GaAs heterojunction bipolar transistor (HBT) process. This balanced VCO has a novel topology using a feedback /spl pi/-network and a common-emitter transistor configuration. Ultra-low phase noise is achieved: -106 dBc/Hz and -130 dBc/Hz at 100kHz and 1-MHz offset frequency, respectively. To the authors' knowledge, this is the lowest phase noise achieved in a monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) VCO at such high frequency. The single-ended output power is -1 dBm. It can be tuned between 25.33GHz and 25.75GHz using the base-collector junction capacitor of the HBT as a varactor. The dc power consumption is 90mW for a 9-V supply. An excellent figure-of-merit of -195 dBc/Hz is obtained.     

A 20 mW, 150 GHz InP HEMT MMIC power amplifier module

This paper describes a power amplifier (PA) module containing an InP high electron mobility transistor (HEMT) monolithic millimeter-wave integrated circuit (MMIC) amplifier chip, designed, and packaged at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and fabricated at HRL Laboratories. The module features 20 mW of output power at 150 GHz, with more than 10 mW available in the 148-160 GHz frequency range.     

Coplanar millimeter-wave ICs for W-band applications using 0.15μm pseudomorphic MODFETs

A small signal S-parameter and noise model for the cascode MODFET has been validated up to 120 GHz, allowing predictable monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) design up to W-band. The potential of coplanar waveguide technology to build compact, high performance system modules is demonstrated by means of passive and active MMIC components. The realized passive structures comprise a Wilkinson combiner/divider and a capacitively loaded ultra miniature branch line coupler. For both building blocks, very good agreement between the measured and modeled data is achieved up to 120 GHz. Based on the accurate design database, two versions of compact integrated amplifiers utilizing cascode devices for application in the 90-120 GHz frequency range were designed and fabricated. The MMICs have 26.3 dB and 20 dB gain at 91 GHz and 110 GHz, respectively. A noise figure of 6.4 dB was measured at 110 GHz. The 90-100 GHz amplifier was integrated with an MMIC tunable oscillator resulting in a W-band source delivering more than 6 dBm output power from 94 to 98 GHz     

Low phase noise millimeter-wave frequency sources using InP-basedHBT MMIC technology

A family of millimeter-wave sources based on InP heterojunction bipolar transistor (HBT) monolithic microwave/millimeter-wave integrated circuit (MMIC) technology has been developed. These sources include 40-GHz, 46-GHz, 62-GHz MMIC fundamental mode oscillators, and a 95-GHz frequency source module using a 23.8-GHz InP HBT MMIC dielectric resonator oscillator (DRO) in conjunction with a GaAs-based high electron mobility transistor (HEMT) MMIC frequency quadrupler and W-band output amplifiers. Good phase noise performance was achieved due to the low 1/f noise of the InP-based HBT devices. To our knowledge, this is the first demonstration of millimeter-wave sources using InP-based HBT MMIC's     

紧凑型Ka波段PHEMT微波单片集成VCO

设计并流片制作了基于GaAs PHEMT工艺的Ka波段微波单片集成压控振荡器(MMIC VCO).该VCO具有紧凑、宽电调谐带宽及高输出功率的特点.提出了缩小芯片面积及增大调谐带宽的方法,同时还给出了设计MMIC VCO的基本步骤.该方法设计并流片制做的MMIC VCO的测量结果为:振荡频率为36±1.2GHz,输出功率为10士1dBm,芯片面积为1.3mm×1.0mm.     

A single-supply Ku-band 1-W power amplifier MMIC with compact self-bias PHEMTs

In this letter, the design of a self-bias 1.8-mm AlGaAs/InGaAs/GaAs pseudomorphic high electron mobility transistor with a compact source capacitor for operation in Ku-band frequency is described. Based on the proposed device, a self-bias Ku-band 1-W two-stage power amplifier monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) is also demonstrated. Under a single bias condition of 8 V and 630 mA, the self-bias MMIC possesses 14.2-dB small-signal gain, 30.2-dBm output power at 1-dB gain compression point with 19.2% power added efficiency and 31.3-dBm saturated output power with 22.5% power added efficiency at 14GHz. With the performance comparable to the dual-bias MMIC counterpart, the proposed self-bias MMIC is more attractive to system designers on very small aperture terminal applications.     

Power-amplifier modules covering 70-113 GHz using MMICs

A set of W-band power amplifier (PA) modules using monolithic microwave integrated circuits (MMICs) have been developed for the local oscillators of the far-infrared and sub-millimeter telescope (FIRST). The MMIC PA chips include three driver and three PAs, designed using microstrip lines, and another two smaller driver amplifiers using coplanar waveguides, covering the entire W-band. The highest frequency PA, which covers 100-113 GHz, has a peak power of greater than 250 mW (25 dBm) at 105 GHz, which is the best output power performance for a monolithic amplifier above 100 GHz to date. These monolithic PA chips are fabricated using 0.1-μm AlGaAs/InGaAs/GaAs pseudomorphic T-gate power high electron-mobility transistors on a 2-mil GaAs substrate. The module assembly and testing, together with the system applications, is also addressed in this paper     

A monolithic Ka-band 0.25 μm GaAs MESFET transmitterfor high volume production

A monolithic Ka-band transmitter consisting of a voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) and a power amplifier using 0.25 μm MESFET technology has been developed for high volume production. An output power of 21.5 dBm at 35.4 GHz with a tuning range of 600 MHz has been achieved. Hundreds of these monolithic transmitters have been fabricated, and an RF yield of 40% has ben achieved from the GaAs MMIC pilot line based on the total number of wafers started. The high yield obtained from this high level integration of multifunctional MMIC chips indicates the maturity of the design and processing capability of millimeter-wave (MMW) GaAs MESFET technology     

Design and performance of octave S/C band MMICT/R modules for multi-function phased arrays

A complex wideband transmit/receive module that achieves performance levels superior to any MMIC module is described. Peak performance within the octave 3.0 to 6.0 GHz band includes a power output of 21 W at S-band and 19 W at C-band, a noise figure of 3.9 to 5.0 dB, 30 to 38 dB of receive gain, 25 to 26 dBm output IP₃, 40 dB of gain control in 256 steps, dual receive channels with independent amplitude and phase control, and an 8-bit phase shifter with less than 1 degree calibrated RMS phase error. Total GaAs area is 146 mm² with 170 mm of total gate periphery. The module incorporates a compact digital interface, requires only three supply voltages, and utilizes advanced packaging techniques, resulting in a size compatible with a grating lobe free grid spacing     

A V-Band Monolithic AlGaN/GaN VCO

A V-band push-push GaN monolithic microwave integrated circuit voltage controlled oscillator (VCO) has been realized based on a 0.2 mum T-gate AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility transistor technology with an fT ~ 65 GHz. The GaN VCO delivered an output power of +11 dBm at 53 GHz with an estimated phase noise of -97 dBc/Hz at 1 MHz offset based on on-wafer measurement. To the best of our knowledge, this is the highest frequency VCO ever reported for GaN technology with a high output power at V-band, without using any buffer amplifier. This work demonstrates the potential of applying GaN technology to millimeter wave band, high power, and low phase noise frequency sources applications.     

Integration of high-Q GaAs varactor diodes and 0.25 μmGaAs MESFET's for multifunction millimeter-wave monolithic circuitapplications

Two technologies are demonstrated whereby high-Q, vertical-structure, abrupt-junction varactor diodes are monolithically integrated with 0.25-μm GaAs MESFETs on semi-insulating GaAs substrates for multifunction millimeter-wave monolithic circuit applications. Diodes with various anode sizes have been realized with measured capacitance swings of >2.1:1 from 0 V to -4 V and series resistances of approximately 1 Ω. Diodes having a zero bias capacitance of 0.35 pF have Q's of >19000 (50 MHz) with -4 V applied to the anode. Under power bias conditions, the MESFETs have a measured gain of >6 dB at 35 GHz with extrapolated values for f _t and f_max of 32 GHz and 78 GHz, respectively. Using these technologies, a monolithic Ka-band voltage controlled oscillator (VCO) containing a varactor diode, a 0.25-μm GaAs MESFET, and the usual MMIC passive components has been built and tested. At around 31 GHz, the circuit has demonstrated 60-mW power output with 300 MHz of tuning bandwidth     

GaAs Monolithic MIC's for Direct Broadcast Satellite Receivers

A 12-GHz low-noise amplifier (LNA), a 1-GHz IF amplifier (IFA), and an 11-GHz dielectric resonator oscillator (DRO) have been developed for DBS home receiver applications by using GaAs monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) technology. Each MMIC chip contains FET's as active elements and self-biasing source resistors and bypass capacitors for a single power supply operation. It also contairns dc-block and RF-bypass capacitors. The three-stage LNA exhibits a 3.4-dB noise figure and a 19.5-dB gain over 11.7-12.2 GHz. The negative-feedback-type three-stage IFA shows a 3.9-dB noise figure and a 23-dB gain over 0.5-1.5 GHz. The DRO gives 10.mW output power at 10.67 GHz, with a frequency stability of 1.5 MHz over a temperature range from -40-80°C. A direct broadcast satellite (DBS) receiver incorporating these MMIC's exhibits an overafl noise figure of /spl les/ 4.0 dB for frequencies from 11.7-12.2 GHz.     

Hybrid ring coupler for W-band MMIC applications using MEMS technology

The hybrid ring coupler was designed and fabricated on a GaAs substrate using surface micromachining techniques, which adopted dielectric-supported air-gapped microstrip line (DAML) structure. The fabrication process of DAML is compatible with the standard monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) techniques, and the hybrid ring coupler can be simply integrated into a plane-structural MMIC. The fabricated hybrid ring coupler shows wideband characteristics of the coupling loss of 3.57 /spl plusmn/ 0.22dB and the transmission loss of 3.80 /spl plusmn/ 0.08dB across the measured frequency range of 85 to 105GHz. The isolation characteristics and output phase differences are -34dB and 180/spl plusmn/1/spl deg/, at 94GHz, respectively.     

A compact and low-phase-noise Ka-band pHEMT-based VCO

A low phase-noise Ka-band monolithic voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) designed using the negative resistance concept is reported. A circuit fabricated using the three-dimensional monolithic microwave integrated circuit technology exhibits a high integration level; its size is a record at just 0.5 mm/sup 2/. On-wafer measurements demonstrate a low phase noise of -102 dBc/Hz at a 1-MHz offset. The VCO delivers an output power of 11.8 dBm at the center frequency of 28.3 GHz. The frequency tuning range is more than 3.8 GHz. Dependence of the circuit performance on the bias conditions is also reported and suggests that an optimum phase-noise characteristic can be achieved when biasing the transistor to optimize its transconductance and noise figure.