A SiGe active sub-harmonic front-end for 5-6 GHz direct-conversion receiver applications

Author

Svitek, Richard ; Raman, Sanjay

Author_Institution

Wireless Microsystems Lab, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA

fYear

2003

Firstpage

675

Lastpage

678

Abstract

This paper describes the design and measurement of a fabricated SiGe RF front-end for use in direct-conversion receivers for the Unlicensed National Information Infrastructure (U-NII) bands. The front-end is composed of an LNA, I and Q ×2 sub-harmonic mixers (SHMs), and an LO conditioning chain. The receiver is completely differential and is designed for operation from a 3.3 V supply. The current consumption is ∼6 mA for the LNA and ∼5 mA for each mixer. The I/Q mixer pair alone (front-end without LNA) demonstrates ∼8-10 dB gain and an IIP2 of ∼+29 dBm in the lower U-NII bands. Measured receiver performance (with LNA) shows 18-20 dB conversion gain in the lower two U-NII bands, -16 dBm input compression point, and >10 dB return loss across all three U-NII bands.

Keywords

BiCMOS integrated circuits; Ge-Si alloys; mixers (circuits); radio receivers; radiofrequency integrated circuits; semiconductor materials; 10 dB; 18 to 20 dB; 3.3 V; 5 to 6 GHz; 8 to 10 dB; I/Q mixer; LNA; LO conditioning chain; SiGe; SiGe BiCMOS technology; U-NII band; active RF front-end; differential receiver; direct-conversion receiver; sub-harmonic mixer; Circuit topology; Gain measurement; Germanium silicon alloys; Image converters; Loss measurement; Packaging; Radio frequency; Radiofrequency integrated circuits; Silicon germanium; Voltage;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Radio Frequency Integrated Circuits (RFIC) Symposium, 2003 IEEE

ISSN

1529-2517

Print_ISBN

0-7803-7694-3

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/RFIC.2003.1214037

Filename

1214037