A 60GHz 4Gb/s fully integrated NRZ-to-QPSK modulator SoC for backhaul links in fiber-wireless networks

This paper presents, for the first time, an optical-to-mm-wave modulator SoC with an integrated 850-nm wavelength optical receiver front-end for short-range backhaul connectivity in emerging fiber-wireless mobile networks. Realized in 65-nm CMOS, the optical front-end achieves -3dBm optical input sensitivity at 4Gb/s with 10^-12 BER. The modulator directly up-converts the de-multiplexed 2Gb/s I/Q NRZ data to a 4Gb/s QPSK signal at 60GHz. The SoC consumes 78mW and produces -7.2dBm output power with -12dB EVM at a bit efficiency of 19.6pJ/b.