Millimeter-wave characterization of Si/SiGe HBTs noise parameters featuring fT/fMAX of 310/400 GHz

High frequency noise parameters (NFmin, Rn, Bopt and Gopt) determination of Si/SiGe HBTs from STMicroelectronics B5T technology are provided for the first time in the millimeter-wave range. In this paper, an integrated tuner is used for the extraction of high frequencies noise parameters with the multi-impedance method. The designed tuner is composed an active part with a low noise amplifier (LNA) and a passive part with a high performances travelling wave digitally tunable capacitance (DTC), both in series with a transmission line design for phase shifting. Measurements exhibit a state of the art NFmin lower than 2 dB at 68 GHz for the HBT.

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