SiGe HBT NPN device optimization for RF power amplifier applications

Author

Joseph, A. ; McPartlin, M. ; Lafontaine, H. ; Forsyth, J. ; Candra, P. ; Previti-Kelly, R. ; Doherty, M.

Author_Institution

IBM Microelectron., Essex Junction, VT, USA

fYear

2009

fDate

12-14 Oct. 2009

Firstpage

174

Lastpage

177

Abstract

This paper describes the optimization of Silicon Germanium (SiGe) NPN bipolar transistors for power amplifier performance. Minimizing the collector resistance and barrier effects in a power device are important to optimize the RF characteristics. Overall, we demonstrate that by optimizing the Ge retrograde design, one can improve the large signal performance to provide 66.5% Power-Added-Efficiency (PAE) at an output power of 15.4 dBm, with 14.1 dB of peak Gain (G_p) and 14.1 dBm P1dB, without degrading BV_ceo.

Keywords

Ge-Si alloys; elemental semiconductors; heterojunction bipolar transistors; power amplifiers; HBT NPN device optimization; RF power amplifier applications; SiGe; bipolar transistors; Bipolar transistors; Design optimization; Germanium silicon alloys; Heterojunction bipolar transistors; Power amplifiers; Power generation; Radio frequency; Radiofrequency amplifiers; Signal design; Silicon germanium; Power amplifier; SiGe NPN;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Bipolar/BiCMOS Circuits and Technology Meeting, 2009. BCTM 2009. IEEE

Conference_Location

Capri

ISSN

1088-9299

Print_ISBN

978-1-4244-4894-4

Electronic_ISBN

1088-9299

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/BIPOL.2009.5314249

Filename

5314249