An Ultra-Wideband High-Linearity CMOS Mixer With New Wideband Active Baluns

A 2-11-GHz high linearity CMOS down-conversion mixer with wideband active baluns using 0.18-mum CMOS technology is demonstrated in this paper. The mixer employs a folded cascode Gilbert cell topology and on-chip broadband active baluns. The folded cascode approach is adopted to increase the output swing, and the linearity is enhanced by a harmonic distortion canceling technique derived from the harmonic balance analysis. The proposed configuration shows the highest IIP3 and IP1 dB, and exhibits more compact size than most published studies. A broadband active balun is used to generate wideband differential signals, together with the derivation of a closed-form expression for the phase imbalance. This single-ended wideband mixer has the conversion gain of 6.9plusmn1.5 dB, input 1-dB compression point (IP1 dB) of - 3.5 dBm, single-sideband noise figure of 15.5 dB, and third-order input intercept point (IIP3) of 6.5 dBm under the power consumption of 25.7 mW from a 1.8-V power supply. The chip area is 0.85 x 0.57 mm2.

[1]  Arpad L. Scholtz,et al.  Comparison of linearization techniques for differential amplifiers in integrated circuit design , 1994, Proceedings of MELECON '94. Mediterranean Electrotechnical Conference.

[2]  Deukhyoun Heo,et al.  A 5.6-GHz CMOS doubly balanced sub-harmonic mixer for direct conversion -zero IF receiver , 2004, 2004 IEEE Workshop on Microelectronics and Electron Devices.

[3]  Youngwoo Kwon,et al.  A highly-integrated Doherty amplifier for CDMA handset applications using an active phase splitter , 2005, IEEE Microwave and Wireless Components Letters.

[4]  Chien-Nan Kuo,et al.  Low power 8-GHz ultra-wideband active balun , 2006, Digest of Papers. 2006 Topical Meeting on Silicon Monolithic Integrated Circuits in RF Systems.

[5]  Huei Wang,et al.  A Low Power Folded Mixer for UWB System Applications in 0.18-$\mu$m CMOS Technology , 2007, IEEE Microwave and Wireless Components Letters.

[6]  Kazuki Tateoka,et al.  A GaAs single balanced mixer MMIC with built-in active balun for personal communication systems , 1995, IEEE 1995 Microwave and Millimeter-Wave. Monolithic Circuits Symposium. Digest of Papers.

[7]  John R. Long,et al.  A feedforward compensated high-linearity differential transconductor for RF applications , 2004, 2004 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems (IEEE Cat. No.04CH37512).

[8]  Dong Hun Shin,et al.  A 1.2-V, 5.8-mW, Ultra-Wideband Folded Mixer in 0.13-/spl mu/m CMOS , 2007, 2007 IEEE Radio Frequency Integrated Circuits (RFIC) Symposium.

[9]  J. Durec,et al.  A linear class AB single-ended to differential transconverter suitable for RF circuits , 1996, 1996 IEEE MTT-S International Microwave Symposium Digest.

[10]  Guo-Wei Huang,et al.  Monolithic Broadband Gilbert Micromixer With an Integrated Marchand Balun Using Standard Silicon IC Process , 2006, IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques.

[11]  Huei Wang,et al.  A 0.3-25-GHz ultra-wideband mixer using commercial 0.18-/spl mu/m CMOS technology , 2004 .

[12]  P. Quinn.  A cascode amplifier nonlinearity correction technique , 1981, 1981 IEEE International Solid-State Circuits Conference. Digest of Technical Papers.

[13]  J. Graffeuil,et al.  Design of an original K-band active balun with improved broadband balanced behavior , 2005, IEEE Microwave and Wireless Components Letters.

[14]  Aarno Pärssinen,et al.  Cancellation of second-order intermodulation distortion and enhancement of IIP2 in common-source and common-emitter RF transconductors , 2005, IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems I: Regular Papers.

[15]  A. Gutierrez-Aitken,et al.  A DC-20-GHz InP HBT balanced analog multiplier for high-data-rate direct-digital modulation and fiber-optic receiver applications , 2000 .

[16]  E. Abou-Allam,et al.  Low-voltage 1.9-GHz front-end receiver in 0.5-μm CMOS technology , 2001, IEEE J. Solid State Circuits.

[17]  Chinchun Meng,et al.  Wideband impedance matched GaInP/GaAs HBT Gilbert micromixer with 12 dB gain , 2002, Proceedings. IEEE Asia-Pacific Conference on ASIC,.

[18]  Katsuhiko Araki,et al.  A Novel Broadband Active Balun , 2003, 2003 33rd European Microwave Conference, 2003.

[19]  Kwyro Lee,et al.  Highly linear receiver front-end adopting MOSFET transconductance linearization by multiple gated transistors , 2004, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits.

[20]  S.K. Islam,et al.  High performance CMOS converter design in TSMC 0.18-/spl mu/m process , 2005, Proceedings. IEEE SoutheastCon, 2005..

[21]  A. Platzker,et al.  A novel MMIC biphase modulator with variable gain using enhancement-mode FETS suitable for 3 V wireless applications , 1994, Proceedings of 1994 IEEE Microwave and Millimeter-Wave Monolithic Circuits Symposium.

[22]  Yi-Jen Chan,et al.  A 0.5–7.5 GHz Ultra Low-Voltage Low-Power Mixer Using Bulk-Injection Method by 0.18- $\mu$m CMOS Technology , 2007, IEEE Microwave and Wireless Components Letters.

[23]  Chinchun Meng,et al.  GaInP/GaAs HBT wideband transformer Gilbert downconverter with low voltage supply , 2008 .

[24]  Ro-Min Weng,et al.  A 1.5 V high-linearity CMOS mixer for 2.4 GHz applications , 2004, 2004 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems (IEEE Cat. No.04CH37512).

[25]  Sang-Gug Lee,et al.  Gain mismatch-balanced I/Q down-conversion mixer for UWB , 2006, 2006 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems.

[26]  Fujiang Lin,et al.  Novel active differential phase splitters in RFIC for wireless applications , 1998, RFIC 1998.

[27]  Huei Wang,et al.  A 0 . 3 – 25-GHz Ultra-Wideband Mixer Using Commercial 0 . 18-m CMOS Technology , 2004 .

[28]  Shyh-Jong Chung,et al.  A Wideband CMOS Mixer with Feedforward Compensated Differential Transconductor , 2007, 2007 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems.

[29]  Chinchun Meng,et al.  DC to 8 GHz 11 dB gain Gilbert micromixer using GaInP/GaAs HBT technology , 2003 .

[30]  B. Gilbert,et al.  The MICROMIXER: a highly linear variant of the Gilbert mixer using a bisymmetric Class-AB input stage , 1997, IEEE J. Solid State Circuits.

[31]  David D. Wentzloff,et al.  IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques and Antennas and Propagation Announce a Joint Special Issue on Ultra-Wideband (UWB) Technology , 2010 .

[32]  Ahmad Yazdi,et al.  Design and analysis of an ultrawide-band distributed CMOS mixer , 2005, IEEE Transactions on Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI) Systems.