Abstract
In this paper a new LC oscillator without tail current source with an impedance transformation block (ITB) has been presented. Using this ITB, the noise generation from active devices is reduced. The cross-coupled transistors remain mostly in the saturation region and prevent decreasing of LC-tank quality factor. Moreover this structure benefits from more relaxed start-up condition as compared to the conventional LC oscillators and preserves its low phase-noise performance even in low voltage operation. This oscillator is designed and simulated in 0.18 µm CMOS process. The simulation results show that the proposed oscillator achieved a phase noise between −138.5 and −141.2 dBc/Hz at 3 MHz frequency offset with 23 % tuning range between 4.61 and 5.79 GHz. The corresponding Figure-of-merit in this tuning range is between −189.1 and −192.1 dBc/Hz which is among the best reported performance in comparison to the other state of the arts designs.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Hegazi, E., Sjoland, H., & Abidi, A. A. (2001). A filtering technique to lower LC oscillator phase noise. IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, 36(12), 1921–1930.
An, Hu, & Chodavarapu, Vamsy P. (2012). A 900 MHz low power LC-VCO with improved phase noise performance. Analog Integrated Circuits and Signal Processing, 71(2), 197–210.
Liu, P., Upadhyaya, P., Jung, J., Heo, D., Kim, J. H., & Kim, B. S. (2012). Low phase noise LC VCO with reduced drain current duty cycle. Electronics Letters, 48(2), 77–78.
Soltanian, B., & Kinget, P. R. (2006). Tail current-shaping to improve phase noise in LC voltage-controlled oscillators. IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, 41(8), 1792–1802.
Hajimiri, A., & Lee, T. H. (1998). A general theory of phase noise in electrical oscillators. IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, 33(2), 179–194.
Mazzanti, A., & Andreani, P. (2008). Class-C harmonic CMOS VCOs, with a general result on phase noise. IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, 43(12), 2716–2729.
Pepe, F., Bonfanti, A., Levantino, S., Samori, C., & Lacaita, A. L. (2013). Suppression of flicker noise up-conversion in a 65-nm CMOS VCO in the 3.0-to-3.6 GHz band. IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, 48(10), 2375–2389.
Casha, Owen, Grech, Ivan, & Micallef, Joseph. (2009). Issues on the design and implementation of radio frequency CMOS LC tank voltage-controlled oscillators. Analog Integrated Circuits and Signal Processing, 61(2), 159–170.
Leeson, D. B. (1966). A simple model of feedback oscillator noise spectrum. Proceedings of the IEEE RFIC Virtual Journal, 54(2), 329–330.
Rael, J. J., & Abidi, A. A. (2000). Physical processes of phase noise in differential LC oscillators. In Proeedings of IEEE Custom integraed circuits conference, pp. 569–572.
Fanori, L., & Andreani, P. (2013). Class-D CMOS oscillators. IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, 48, 3105–3119.
Staszewski, R. B., Chih-Ming, H., Barton, N., Meng-Chang, L., & Leipold, D. (2005). A digitally controlled oscillator in a 90 nm digital CMOS process for mobile phones. IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, 40, 2203–2211.
Guansheng, L., Li, L., Yiwu, T., & Afshari, E. (2012). A low-phase-noise wide-tuning-range oscillator based on resonant mode switching. IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, 47, 1295–1308.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Rezaei, M., Jannesari, A. Low-phase-noise CMOS VCO with new drain–gate feedback path. Analog Integr Circ Sig Process 88, 89–95 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10470-016-0755-8
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10470-016-0755-8