Large-area varactor diode for electrically tunable, high-power UHF bandpass filter

An electronically tunable, high-power, UHF (225-400-MHz) bandpass filter which utilizes large-area, high-capacitance varactor diodes has been designed and tested. The varactor diodes with 100-V breakdown potential, uniform impurity density in the active layer and 400-pF capacitance at -8-V bias are used as the tuning elements of the filter. The diodes are fabricated from epitaxial layers grown on high-conductivity silicon substrates. The epitaxial layers include an n⁺transition layer between the substrate and n-type active layer to minimize the growth defects in the n layer which reduce the breakdown potential to a fraction of the theoretical value. Measurements in a test cavity at 151 MHz indicate a diode Q of 190 at -8-V bias. Input power levels of 1-5 W can be accommodated across the tuning range. Insertion loss varies from 4 to 7 dB and intermodulation products are suppressed 30 dB or more for two input tones of 1 W each. This filter exhibits an order-of-magnitude improvement in power-handling capability over present state-of-the-art filters.