Microwave VCO susceptibility to substrate noise in a fully-integrated 150 GHz SiGe HBT BiCMOS technology

Author

Comeau, Jonathan P. ; Cressler, John D.

Author_Institution

Sch. of Electr. & Comput. Eng., Georgia Inst. of Technol., Atlanta, GA, USA

fYear

2005

fDate

12-17 June 2005

Abstract

This work presents two K-band voltage controlled oscillators (VCO) implemented in a fully-integrated SiGe HBT BiCMOS technology, and analyzes their susceptibility to substrate noise. The two VCOs are identical in design, with one utilizing a spiral inductor for the resonant tank, and the other incorporating a thin film microstrip transmission line. Both VCOs exhibit significant (but different) substrate coupling behavior and performance degradation with the injection of parasitic substrate noise. An explanation of the coupling differences between the two VCOs and its relationship to VCO phase noise degradation versus control voltage, and the overall VCO design implications, are addressed.

Keywords

BiCMOS integrated circuits; Ge-Si alloys; bipolar MIMIC; bipolar analogue integrated circuits; integrated circuit design; integrated circuit noise; millimetre wave oscillators; semiconductor materials; voltage-controlled oscillators; 150 GHz; HBT BiCMOS technology; K-band voltage controlled oscillators; SiGe; heterojunction bipolar transistors; microwave voltage controlled oscillators; parasitic substrate noise; phase noise degradation; spiral inductors; substrate coupling behavior; substrate noise susceptibility; thin film microstrip transmission line; BiCMOS integrated circuits; Couplings; Degradation; Germanium silicon alloys; Heterojunction bipolar transistors; Microwave technology; Silicon germanium; Substrates; Thin film inductors; Voltage-controlled oscillators;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Microwave Symposium Digest, 2005 IEEE MTT-S International

ISSN

01490-645X

Print_ISBN

0-7803-8845-3

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/MWSYM.2005.1517198

Filename

1517198