Design of a CMOS multi-mode GNSS receiver VCO

A voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) with dual stages of accumulation mode varactors for a multi- mode global navigation satellite system (GNSS) application, which adopts sigma-delta fractional-N technology in the synthesizer, is presented. The structure is selected to optimize the frequency coverage and tuning linearity, based on a general analysis of the parasitic capacitance in the coarse tuning switch bank cells, which cover the global positioning system (GPS) and Beidou (BD) bands. The VCO implemented in the 0.18 m CMOS process can cover the GPS L1, BD B1, B2 and B3 bands with sufficient margin, and exhibits low phase noise by using this tuning curve linearization technique. The equalized Kvco characteristic behavior further offers a wide voltage tuning range and improves the stability of the closed loop.

[1]  Hans-Martin Rein,et al.  Millimeter-wave VCOs with wide tuning range and low phase noise, fully integrated in a SiGe bipolar production technology , 2003, IEEE J. Solid State Circuits.

[2]  Dong Zhao,et al.  A Dual-Band CMOS Transceiver for 3G TD-SCDMA , 2007, 2007 IEEE International Solid-State Circuits Conference. Digest of Technical Papers.

[3]  Changsik Yoo,et al.  A 4.39–5.26 GHz LC-Tank CMOS Voltage-Controlled Oscillator With Small VCO-Gain Variation , 2009, IEEE Microwave and Wireless Components Letters.

[4]  Paavo Väänänen,et al.  VCO Design With On-Chip Calibration System , 2006, IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems I: Regular Papers.

[5]  R. Castello,et al.  A 1.3 GHz low-phase noise fully tunable CMOS LC VCO , 2000, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits.

[6]  Jaewook Shin,et al.  A Wide-Band CMOS LC VCO With Linearized Coarse Tuning Characteristics , 2008, IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems II: Express Briefs.

[7]  Y. Deval,et al.  Distributed MOS varactor biasing for VCO gain equalization in 0.13 /spl mu/m CMOS technology , 2004, 2004 IEE Radio Frequency Integrated Circuits (RFIC) Systems. Digest of Papers.

[8]  P. Andreani,et al.  On the use of MOS varactors in RF VCOs , 2000, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits.

[9]  Svetozar S. Broussev,et al.  A Wideband Low Phase-Noise LC-VCO With Programmable $K_{\rm VCO}$ , 2007, IEEE Microwave and Wireless Components Letters.

[10]  A. Dec,et al.  Micromachined varactor with wide tuning range , 1997 .

[11]  Yi-Jen Chan,et al.  VCO phase-noise improvement by gate-finger configuration of 0.13-/spl mu/m CMOS transistors , 2005 .

[12]  Peiyuan Guo,et al.  Modeling and simulation of higher-order PLL rotation tracking system in GNSS receiver , 2009, 2009 International Conference on Mechatronics and Automation.

[13]  C. Yue,et al.  On-chip Spiral Inductors With Patterned Ground Shields For Si-based RF IC's , 1997, Symposium 1997 on VLSI Circuits.

[14]  Bodhisatwa Sadhu,et al.  Capacitor bank design for wide tuning range LC VCOs: 850MHz-7.1GHz (157%) , 2010, Proceedings of 2010 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems.

[15]  Francis M. Rotella,et al.  Modeling and optimization of inductors with patterned ground shields for a high performance fully integrated switched tuning VCO , 2002, Proceedings of the IEEE 2002 Custom Integrated Circuits Conference (Cat. No.02CH37285).

[16]  Michiel Steyaert,et al.  A 1.8-GHz CMOS low-phase-noise voltage-controlled oscillator with prescaler , 1995, IEEE J. Solid State Circuits.

[17]  M. Steyaert,et al.  A CMOS 1.8 GHz low-phase-noise voltage-controlled oscillator with prescaler , 1995, Proceedings ISSCC '95 - International Solid-State Circuits Conference.

[18]  S. Mirabbasi,et al.  Characterization and modeling of accumulation-mode MOS varactors , 2005, Canadian Conference on Electrical and Computer Engineering, 2005..

[19]  C. Plett,et al.  The effect of varactor nonlinearity on the phase noise of completely integrated VCOs , 2000, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits.

[20]  Jean-Olivier Plouchart,et al.  Design of wide-band CMOS VCO for multiband wireless LAN applications , 2003, IEEE J. Solid State Circuits.

[21]  G. Avitabile,et al.  Multi-band vco based on distributed VCO and switched-capacitors banks , 2008, MIKON 2008 - 17th International Conference on Microwaves, Radar and Wireless Communications.

[22]  R. Harjani,et al.  /spl Sigma/High-frequency LC VCO design using capacitive degeneration , 2004, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits.

[23]  D. Heo,et al.  A 1V Wide Tuning Range VCO for UHF DTV Tuner , 2007, 2007 Asia-Pacific Microwave Conference.

[24]  Salvatore Levantino,et al.  Frequency dependence on bias current in 5 GHz CMOS VCOs: impact on tuning range and flicker noise upconversion , 2002, IEEE J. Solid State Circuits.

[25]  Eun-Chul Park,et al.  Wideband VCO With Simultaneous Switching of Frequency Band, Active Core, and Varactor Size , 2007, IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits.

[26]  Mohammed Ismail,et al.  CMOS PLLs and VCOs for 4G Wireless , 2004 .

[27]  M. Steyaert,et al.  A fully-integrated GPS receiver front-end with 40 mW power consumption , 2002, 2002 IEEE International Solid-State Circuits Conference. Digest of Technical Papers (Cat. No.02CH37315).

[28]  K. O.,et al.  A 1-V low phase noise multi-band CMOS voltage controlled oscillator with switched inductors and capacitors , 2004, 2004 IEE Radio Frequency Integrated Circuits (RFIC) Systems. Digest of Papers.

[29]  Behzad Razavi,et al.  RF Microelectronics , 1997 .