A 4.8 mW, 4.4 dB NF, wideband LNA using positively coupled transformer for V-band applications

In this paper, a V-band ultra-low power Low Noise Amplifier (LNA) with enhanced bandwidth (BW) is presented. A positively coupled cascode transformer (PCCT), formed using cascode inductors at the emitter of the cascode transistors, is used to couple the signal between the first and second stage. Using an optimum coupling factor of 0.23 for the PCCT, a bandwidth improvement of 15 % was seen during simulation. The prototype was implemented using 0.13 μm SiGe BiCMOS technology. Measurements show a peak gain of 13.5 dB, BW > 8 GHz, Noise Figure (NF) of 4.4 dB and an input 1-dB compression point (Pin,1dB) of -19 dBm. The LNA occupies a core area of only 0.05 mm2 and consumes 3.7 mA from a 1.3 V supply.

[1]  P. Schvan,et al.  Algorithmic Design of CMOS LNAs and PAs for 60-GHz Radio , 2007, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits.

[2]  Jose Silva-Martinez,et al.  A robust feedforward compensation scheme for multistage operational transconductance amplifiers with no Miller capacitors , 2003, IEEE J. Solid State Circuits.

[3]  Yuan-Hung Hsiao,et al.  A 60 GHz low noise amplifier with built-in linearizer , 2013, 2013 IEEE MTT-S International Microwave Symposium Digest (MTT).

[4]  Guo-Wei Huang,et al.  60GHz high-gain low-noise amplifiers with a common-gate inductive feedback in 65nm CMOS , 2011, 2011 IEEE Radio Frequency Integrated Circuits Symposium.

[5]  B. Gaucher,et al.  SiGe bipolar transceiver circuits operating at 60 GHz , 2005, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits.

[6]  J. Long,et al.  31-34GHz low noise amplifier with on-chip microstrip lines and inter-stage matching in 90-nm baseline CMOS , 2006, IEEE Radio Frequency Integrated Circuits (RFIC) Symposium, 2006.

[7]  O. Degani,et al.  A wideband gain-boosting 8mW LNA with 23dB gain and 4dB NF in 65nm CMOS process for 60 GHz applications , 2012, 2012 IEEE Radio Frequency Integrated Circuits Symposium.

[8]  Gang Liu,et al.  Broadband Millimeter-Wave LNAs (47–77 GHz and 70–140 GHz) Using a T-Type Matching Topology , 2013, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits.

[9]  Shawn S. H. Hsu,et al.  CMOS Distributed Amplifiers Using Gate–Drain Transformer Feedback Technique , 2013, IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques.