On the Design of Low-Power Front-End Receiver Circuits for Broadband Optical Free-Space Links

Author

Joyner, Valencia M. ; Harris, Scott ; Sonkusale, Sameer

Author_Institution

Tufts Univ., Medford

fYear

2007

fDate

2-4 July 2007

Firstpage

1

Lastpage

4

Abstract

Optical wireless technology is emerging as a key broadband access technology for short-range, broadband wireless applications, offering several advantages over conventional RF systems in terms of connection speed, power efficiency, low transceiver complexity, networking security, and unregulated bandwidths in the THz range. This paper reviews design aspects of low-power, front-end optical wireless receiver circuits and presents a low-noise front-end preamplifier circuit implementing self-biased, automatic gain control and capable of integration with wide field of view detectors necessary for broadband optical wireless applications. The preamplifier is implemented in a low-cost commodity CMOS technology. For a gain variation of 38 dB to 50 dB, the front-end maintains a stable response and minimum 3 dB bandwidth of 345 MHz with a 6 pF photodiode capacitance. The input-referred noise is 12.5 pA/radicHz at 350 MHz.

Keywords

CMOS integrated circuits; optical fibre networks; optical receivers; photodiodes; telecommunication security; transceivers; CMOS technology; automatic gain control; bandwidth 345 MHz; broadband access technology; broadband optical free-space links; broadband wireless applications; conventional RF systems; frequency 350 MHz; front-end preamplifier circuit; front-end receiver circuits; gain 38 dB to 50 dB; input-referred noise; low-noise preamplifier circuit; low-power receiver circuits; networking security; optical wireless receiver circuits; optical wireless technology; photodiode capacitance; self-biased control; short-range wireless applications; transceiver complexity; Bandwidth; CMOS technology; Circuits; Communication system security; Integrated optics; Optical design; Optical fiber networks; Optical noise; Optical receivers; Preamplifiers; CMOS; automatic gain control; broadband communications; free space optical (FSO); preamplifier; transimpedance amplifier;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Wireless and Optical Communications Networks, 2007. WOCN '07. IFIP International Conference on

Conference_Location

Singapore

Print_ISBN

1-4244-1005-3

Electronic_ISBN

1-4244-1005-3

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/WOCN.2007.4284227

Filename

4284227