Design of a 3.1-10.6GHz low-voltage, low-power CMOS low-noise amplifier for ultra-wideband receivers

A low-voltage, low-power ultra-wideband (UWB) low-noise amplifier (LNA) for IEEE 802.15.3a is presented. A simplified Chebyshev filter is used to achieve the input broadband matching. This input network has lower complexity and good reflected coefficient from 3.1GHz to 10.6GHz. An output-matching buffer is designed specially to match for maintaining high gain at upper frequency. Therefore, it can both achieve flat gain over the whole bandwidth and generate more output current. The LNA is simulated based on TSMC 0.18μm mixed signal/RF process. With only 1V bias voltage, the LNA can achieve power flat gain of 10dB with input matching of -9.76dB; the minimum noise figure 3.7dB; and input third-order-intercept point (IIP3) of -1dB. The power dissipation is only 7.2mW.