L-band AlGaN/GaN power amplifier with protection against load mismatch

Author

van Heijningen, M. ; van der Bent, Gijs ; van der Houwen, E.H. ; Chowdhary, Amitabh ; van Vliet, Frank E.

Author_Institution

TNO, The Hague, Netherlands

fYear

2013

fDate

6-8 Oct. 2013

Firstpage

408

Lastpage

411

Abstract

Solid-state power amplifiers need protection at the output to handle high reflections due to mismatch. Normally this is implemented by using a ferrite-based isolator. These are however large and bulky components. This paper presents a Gallium-Nitride power amplifier module with automatic protection against large reflections based on fold-back protection, by sensing the reflected power. Measurements have been performed on a 100 W L-band power amplifier module at full reflection (short at the output) without damage to the amplifier. The reaction time of the protection mechanism is less than 0.5 μs.

Keywords

III-V semiconductors; aluminium compounds; gallium compounds; power amplifiers; wide band gap semiconductors; AlGaN-GaN; L-band AlGaN-GaN power amplifier; ferrite-based isolator; fold-back protection; gallium-nitride power amplifier; load mismatch; power 100 W; protection mechanism; solid-state power amplifier; Gallium nitride; MMICs; Power amplifiers; Power dissipation; Power generation; Power measurement; Transistors; Gallium nitride; High power amplifiers; MMICs;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Microwave Integrated Circuits Conference (EuMIC), 2013 European

Conference_Location

Nuremberg

Type

conf

Filename

6687872