This expanded and thoroughly revised edition of Thomas H. Lee's acclaimed guide to the design of gigahertz RF integrated circuits features a completely new chapter on the principles of wireless systems. The chapters on low-noise amplifiers, oscillators and phase noise have been significantly expanded as well. The chapter on architectures now contains several examples of complete chip designs that bring together all the various theoretical and practical elements involved in producing a prototype chip. First Edition Hb (1998): 0-521-63061-4 First Edition Pb (1998); 0-521-63922-0

The Design of CMOS Radio-Frequency Integrated Circuits: RF CIRCUITS THROUGH THE AGES

Food product safety is a public health concern. Most of the food safety analytical and detection methods are expensive, labor intensive, and time consuming. A safe, rapid, reliable, and nondestructive detection method is needed to assure consumers that food products are safe to consume. Terahertz (THz) radiation, which has properties of both microwave and infrared, can penetrate and interact with many commonly used materials. Owing to the technological developments in sources and detectors, THz spectroscopic imaging has transitioned from a laboratory-scale technique into a versatile imaging tool with many practical applications. In recent years, THz imaging has been shown to have great potential as an emerging nondestructive tool for food inspection. THz spectroscopy provides qualitative and quantitative information about food samples. The main applications of THz in food industries include detection of moisture, foreign bodies, inspection, and quality control. Other applications of THz technology in the food industry include detection of harmful compounds, antibiotics, and microorganisms. THz spectroscopy is a great tool for characterization of carbohydrates, amino acids, fatty acids, and vitamins. Despite its potential applications, THz technology has some limitations, such as limited penetration, scattering effect, limited sensitivity, and low limit of detection. THz technology is still expensive, and there is no available THz database library for food compounds. The scanning speed needs to be improved in the future generations of THz systems. Although many technological aspects need to be improved, THz technology has already been established in the food industry as a powerful tool with great detection and quantification ability. This paper reviews various applications of THz spectroscopy and imaging in the food industry.

/pdf/a-comprehensive-review-on-food-applications-of-terahertz-1xaiiseg2q.pdf

A Comprehensive Review on Food Applications of Terahertz Spectroscopy and Imaging

A general model is introduced which is capable of making accurate, quantitative predictions about the phase noise of different types of electrical oscillators by acknowledging the true periodically time-varying nature of all oscillators. This new approach also elucidates several previously unknown design criteria for reducing close-in phase noise by identifying the mechanisms by which intrinsic device noise and external noise sources contribute to the total phase noise. In particular, it explains the details of how 1/f noise in a device upconverts into close-in phase noise and identifies methods to suppress this upconversion. The theory also naturally accommodates cyclostationary noise sources, leading to additional important design insights. The model reduces to previously available phase noise models as special cases. Excellent agreement among theory, simulations, and measurements is observed.

/pdf/a-general-theory-of-phase-noise-in-electrical-oscillators-4wii1hcvyl.pdf

A General Theory of Phase Noise in Electrical Oscillators

In this paper, a 240 GHz 16 Gbps QPSK transmitter is demonstrated in 65 nm bulk CMOS process The transmitter chain employs an 80 GHz local oscillator and a modulator to generate the data that is amplified by a class-E switching power amplifier The amplified signal then drives the 240 GHz tripler to generate the required modulated data By using on-chip slotted loop antennas, the transmitter achieves an EIRP of 1 dBm A maximum data rate of 16 Gbps is achieved with a transmitter efficiency of 14 pJ/bit

A 240 GHz Fully Integrated Wideband QPSK Transmitter in 65 nm CMOS

This paper is focused on providing the analytical framework for the quantification and evaluation of the joint effect of misalignment fading and hardware imperfections in the presence of multipath fading at terahertz (THz) wireless fiber extenders. In this context, we present the appropriate system model that incorporates the different operation, design, and environmental parameters. In more detail, it takes into account the transceivers antenna gains, the operation frequency, the distance between the transmitter (TX) and the receiver (RX), the environmental conditions, i.e., temperature, humidity, and pressure, the spatial jitter between the TX and RX antennas that results to antennas misalignment, the level of transceivers' hardware imperfections, and the stochastic characteristics of the wireless channel. Based on this model, we analyze and quantify the joint impact of misalignment and multipath fading by providing novel closed-form expressions for the probability and cumulative density functions of the composite channel. Moreover, we derive exact closed-form expressions for the outage probability for both cases of ideal and non-ideal radio frequency (RF) front-end. In addition, in order to quantify the detrimental effect of misalignment fading, we analytically obtain the outage probability in the absence of misalignment cases for both cases of ideal and non-ideal RF front-end. In addition, we extract the novel closed-form expressions for the ergodic capacity for the case of the ideal RF front-end and tight upper bounds for both the cases of ideal and non-ideal RF front-end. Finally, an insightful ergodic capacity ceiling for the non-ideal RF front-end case is provided.

/pdf/analytical-performance-assessment-of-thz-wireless-systems-1zdtokfrap.pdf

Analytical Performance Assessment of THz Wireless Systems

This paper reports recent results on a current-mode class-S power amplifier for the 450 MHz band, based on GaN-HEMT MMICs. We achieve a peak output power of 8.7 W for a single tone at 420 MHz, encoded in standard band-pass delta-sigma modulation with 1.68 Gbps sampling frequency. The respective efficiency is 34%. We find that these values strongly vary with coding efficiency of the modulation and reach 19 W with 59% for square-wave excitation. In order to clarify the potential of the PA in more detail, the S-class characteristics at power back-off and with varying oversampling ratio are presented as well.

RF class-S power amplifiers: State-of-the-art results and potential

A 245 GHz transmitter (TX) with an integrated antenna for sensing applications has been realized, which consists of a push-push VCO with a 1/64 frequency divider, a transformer-coupled one-stage power amplifier, a frequency doubler, and an on-chip antenna with localized backside etching. The frequency of the TX is tunable by an external PLL in the range from 239.5 GHz to 250.8 GHz. The TX is fabricated in 0.13 μm SiGe:C BiCMOS technology with fT/fmax of 300GHz/500GHz. The output power of the TX is 1 dBm at 245 GHz. The TX including the frequency divider dissipates 0.38 W. The EIRP of the transmitter with antenna was measured using an external receive horn antenna. The EIRP reaches about 7 dBm at 245 GHz. This value represents the highest EIRP reported for a 245 GHz transmitter with integrated single antenna so far.

245 GHz SiGe transmitter with integrated antenna and external PLL

We present a wafer-level heterointegrated indium phosphide double heterobipolar transistor on silicon germanium bipolar-complementary metal oxide semiconductor (InP DHBT on SiGe BiCMOS) process which relies on adhesive wafer bonding. Subcircuits are co-designed in both technologies, SiGe BiCMOS and InP DHBT, with more than 300 GHz bandwidth microstrip interconnects. The 250 nm SiGe HBTs offer cutoff frequencies around 200 GHz, the 800 nm InP DHBTs exceed 350 GHz. Heterointegrated signal sources are demonstrated including a 328 GHz quadrupling source with dBm RF output power. A common design kit for full InP DHBT/SiGe BiCMOS co-design was set up. The technology is being opened to third-party customers through IHP's multi-purpose wafer foundry interface.







Microphotograph of InP DHBT / SiGe BiCMOS wafer

SciFab -a wafer-level heterointegrated InP DHBT/SiGe BiCMOS foundry process for mm-wave applications

This paper reports on design and realization of monolithic switch-mode amplifiers for data rates up to 1.8 Gbps, suitable for Class-S and inverse class-D PA modules. GaN HEMT as well as high-voltage GaAs-HBT technologies are employed and compared. For digital signal transmission without output filtering, the chips achieve efficiencies of more than 90 % at an output power of 5.4 W and 6.5 W with PAE values including the on-chip drivers, of 75% and 80% for GaAs-HBT and GaN-HEMT Ics respectively. These high efficiencies values are very promising since such PA chips represent the key building block for future class S systems.

Switch-mode amplifier ICs with over 90% efficiency for Class-S PAs using GaAs-HBTs and GaN-HEMTs

A 240 GHz direct conversion IQ receiver manufactured in 0.13 SiGe BiCMOS technology with fT/fmax of 300/500 GHz is presented. The receiver consists of a four stage LNA, an active power divider, an LO IQ generation network, and direct down-conversion fundamental mixers. The integrated IQ receiver yields a conversion gain of 18 dB, an 18 dB simulated DSB NF, and a 3 dB bandwidth of 25 GHz. The required 245 GHz LO power is in the order of -10 dBm. The receiver exhibits an IQ amplitude and phase imbalance of 1 dB and 3° respectively. It draws 135 mA from the 3.5 V supply and 20 mA from 2 V.

Chafik Meliani

Papers

RF class-S power amplifiers: State-of-the-art results and potential

245 GHz SiGe transmitter with integrated antenna and external PLL

SciFab -a wafer-level heterointegrated InP DHBT/SiGe BiCMOS foundry process for mm-wave applications

Switch-mode amplifier ICs with over 90% efficiency for Class-S PAs using GaAs-HBTs and GaN-HEMTs

A 240 GHz direct conversion IQ receiver in 0.13 μm SiGe BiCMOS technology