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Journal ArticleDOI

High- $Q$ Solenoid Inductors With a CMOS-Compatible Concave-Suspending MEMS Process

Lei Gu, +1 more
- 01 Oct 2007 - 
- Vol. 16, Iss: 5, pp 1162-1172
TLDR
In this paper, the authors presented micromachined solenoid inductors that are fabricated in a standard CMOS silicon substrate (with a resistivity of 1-8 Omega cm) and concavely embedded in a silicon cavity with the silicon wafer surface remaining a plane.
Abstract
This paper presents micromachined solenoid inductors that are fabricated in a standard CMOS silicon substrate (with a resistivity of 1-8 Omega cm) The solenoid is concavely embedded in a silicon cavity with the silicon wafer surface remaining a plane, and mechanically suspended to form an air gap from the bottom of the silicon cavity In addition to facilitating flip-chip packaging, this so-called "concave-suspending" technique effectively depresses the substrate effects including eddy current and capacitive coupling between the coil and the substrate, therefore contributing to both high Q -factor and high resonant frequency of the inductors for high-performance radio-frequency (RF)/microwave integrated circuit applications Various inductors with different solenoid layouts, eg, several shapes of curved solenoids, have been successfully fabricated by using a post-CMOS microelectromechanical systems process that employs copper electroplating, tetra-methyl-ammonium hydroxide (TMAH) + iso- propanol etching and compensation control for convex-corner undercutting, photoresist spray coating, XeF2 gaseous etching, and other steps A lumped circuit model that accounts for inter- turn fringing capacitance, capacitance between the coil and the substrate, substrate ohmic loss and substrate capacitance, etc, is derived for the solenoid inductors The accuracy of the model is confirmed by the testing results and can be used for optimal design of the inductors By S-parameter testing, various types of inductors with different solenoid layouts have been evaluated The solenoid inductors generally exhibit improved RF performance in Q-factor and self-resonance frequency compared to their conventional counterparts

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Citations
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Book ChapterDOI

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

Thomas H. Lee
TL;DR: In this paper, an 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.
Book ChapterDOI

The Modeling, Characterization, and Design of Monolithic Inductors for Silicon RF IC's

Behzad Razavi
TL;DR: In this article, the results of a comprehensive investigation into the characteristics and optimization of inductors fabricated with the top-level metal of a submicron silicon VLSI process are presented.
Journal ArticleDOI

Fully Integrated On-Chip Coil in 0.13 $\mu {\rm m}$ CMOS for Wireless Power Transfer Through Biological Media

TL;DR: This paper presents a 2 × 2.18 mm2 on-chip wireless power transfer (WPT) receiver (Rx) coil fabricated in 0.13 μm CMOS that enables the delivery of milliwatts of power to application circuits while staying below safe power density and electromagnetic exposure limits.
Proceedings ArticleDOI

Silicon-embedded 3D toroidal air-core inductor with through-wafer interconnect for on-chip integration

TL;DR: In this paper, a topologically complex 3D toroidal inductor is fabricated in a deep silicon trench, and is coupled to the wafer surface with high-power, electroplated through-wafer interconnect.
Journal ArticleDOI

RF MEMS Inductors and Their Applications--A Review

TL;DR: This review gives a comprehensive survey on the developments and performances of fixed and variable RF MEMS inductors, and summarizes the best fabrication and tuning approaches inferred from the reviewed works.
References
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Journal Article

The design of CMOS radio-frequency integrated circuits, 2nd edition

TL;DR: 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.
Book

The Design of CMOS Radio-Frequency Integrated Circuits

TL;DR: In this article, the authors present an expanded and thoroughly revised edition of Tom Lee's acclaimed guide to the design of gigahertz RF integrated circuits, which is packed with physical insights and design tips, and includes a historical overview of the field in context.
Journal ArticleDOI

Design of Planar Rectangular Microelectronic Inductors

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors derived inductance equations for planar thin- or thick-film coils, comparing equations that include negative mutual inductance with those that do not, and presented a computer program developed for calculating inductances for both square and rectangular geometries, the variables considered being track width, space between tracks, and number of turns.
Journal ArticleDOI

Physical modeling of spiral inductors on silicon

TL;DR: In this article, the authors present a physical model for planar spiral inductors on silicon, which accounts for eddy current effect in the conductor, crossover capacitance between the spiral and center-tap, capacitance in the spiral, substrate ohmic loss, and substrate capacitance.
Journal ArticleDOI

The modeling, characterization, and design of monolithic inductors for silicon RF IC's

TL;DR: In this paper, the results of a comprehensive investigation into the characteristics and optimization of inductors fabricated with the top-level metal of a submicron silicon VLSI process are presented.
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