An X-band low-power CMOS low noise amplifier with transformer inter-stage matching networks

This paper presents a low-power low noise amplifier (LNA) using standard 0.18-μm CMOS technology for X-band satellite receiver applications. Two-stage common source configuration with transformer matching network is chosen to achieve low power, low noise, and compact size while maintaining reasonable gain performance. The measured small signal gain is 13.4 dB at 11 GHz with low power consumption of 4.8 mW from a 1 V supply voltage. The chip size is 0.44 mm². With noise match at the first stage, the measured noise figure (NF) of the LNA is 3.41 dB at 11 GHz. Compared to previously reported X-band LNA in 0.18-μm CMOS process, the presented LNA demonstrates the highest FOM.