Integrated transceiver arrays for multiple antenna systems

In this paper, we present area-efficient multiple antenna transceiver front ends. A portion of the greatly increased capacity (compared to a single antenna system) of the multiple antenna system is traded off for relaxed circuit noise requirements. This allows circuits without physically large on-chip inductors to be used, resulting in significant chip area savings. Comparing the area and noise performance between a narrowband low noise amplifier (LNA) and a broadband LNA shows a simulated 3 dB increase in noise figure but a threefold decrease in area. Furthermore, multiple receiver front ends for a proposed four transmit, four receive antenna (4×4) system have a smaller area than some reported single front ends.