A single-chip 630 GHz transmitter with 210 GHz sub-harmonic PLL local oscillator in 130 nm InP HBT

We present a 630 GHz transmitter IC based on a 210 GHz PLL and 3^rd-order sub-harmonic transmit mixer in an 130nm InP HBT process. The transmitter output can be tuned across 15 GHz with −51 dBc and −74 dBc of phase noise at 100 Hz and 10 KHz offset, respectively. Measured saturated RF power was −30 to −33 dBm, while consuming 650 mW. The transmitter IC occupies 1.37 mm². To the authors´ knowledge, this work represents the first terahertz transmitter with on-chip (phase-locked) frequency generation.