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A W-Band Transformer-Based Power Amplifier with Anti-Pair Capacitors in 0.13-μm SiGe BiCMOS

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Abstract

This paper presents a W-band three-stage amplifier using 0.13-μm SiGe BiCMOS process, which is implemented with transformers for inter-stage matching and single-to-differential transformation. However, for balun operation, conventional transformer exhibits imbalance characteristic resulting from the complex parasitic effects arising in the millimeter-wave frequency range. An anti-pair capacitor structure is devised and applied to improve amplitude and phase balance and further benefit the RF performance. A two-way transformer-based parallel combiner embedded with several co-optimizing elements is designed to implement power combining and optimum load impedance matching. The amplifier achieves a peak gain of 28.2 dB at 93 GHz, with a 3-dB bandwidth from 85 to 96 GHz. The measured saturated output power (Psat) and maximum power added efficiency (PAE) at 94 GHz are 14.1 dBm and 9.2%, respectively. The power amplifier with only 0.6-mm2 area exhibits excellent gain and maintains competitive output power and PAE in W-band.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank MISIC Microelectronics, Nanjing, China, for supporting the chip fabrication.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Millimeter Waves, Southeast University, Purple Mountain Laboratories, Nanjing, 210096, China

    Huanbo Li, Jixin Chen, Debin Hou, Pinpin Yan & Wei Hong

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  1. Huanbo Li
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  2. Jixin Chen
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  3. Debin Hou
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  4. Pinpin Yan
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  5. Wei Hong
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Correspondence to Jixin Chen.

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Li, H., Chen, J., Hou, D. et al. A W-Band Transformer-Based Power Amplifier with Anti-Pair Capacitors in 0.13-μm SiGe BiCMOS. J Infrared Milli Terahz Waves 40, 822–837 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10762-019-00606-z

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