Silicon-based RF ICs up to 100 GHz: research trends and applications

This paper presents recent advances in circuit design which evaluate the high-speed and low-power potential of state-of-the-art CMOS and SiGe bipolar technologies. In 0.13 μm CMOS a 17 GHz ISM/WLAN RF front-end with only 130 mW power consumption is described. An injection locked frequency divider with a power consumption as low as 3 mW at 40 GHz is presented. A fully integrated 2:1 multiplexer IC which operates up to 50 Gb/s data rate has been realized in CMOS. A 100 Gbit/s amplifier in a 200 GHz/275 GHz f_T/f_max SiGe bipolar technology with 16 dB gain has been realized. Finally, a 65 GHz - 95 GHz double-balanced mixer for 77 GHz automotive radar applications is discussed.