Monolithic single FET mixers with coplanar technology to convert between V and C band

In this paper the design of single FET coplanar mixers to convert signals between V and C band is presented. A step by step design technique was used, based on harmonic balance simulation. The mixer non-linear device is a PMHFET with a 0.15 /spl mu/m T-gate. Two different topologies were designed, fabricated and tested: cold mixer and drain mixer. The mixers were optimised for minimum conversion losses on the widest possible bandwidth in order to be used on a large number of applications. The experiments show: for the cold mixer, a conversion loss on a 8 GHz band in the range of 8 to 10 dB both as up and downconverter; and 2.5 dB on a 4 GHz band for the drain mixer as down converter.