An integral shannon-based view on smart front-ends

This paper describes how trends in information society, communication technology, microwave technology, and IC-design technology, ask for a different view on front-ends. The communication channel will be described from a high level, as one dasiaShannon channelpsila, comprising a chain of cascaded sub channels. Trends influencing each sub channel will be addressed. From that, we will argue that an integral approach to the design of the communication chain will be a prerequisite for the design of future front-ends. Moreover, the design of the front-end will become dominated by the IC part of the chain, rather than by the transmission channel, which will lead to dasiaconversion-drivenpsila rather than dasiatransmission-channel drivenpsila analog front-ends. Finally, it will be shown that future converters will have to be smart. Although applied to wireless, the conclusions are generic and as such can be applied to wired communication channels too.