Design of a LC VCO and injection locked frequency divider special for Ka-band application

This paper presents the design and implementation a voltage controlled oscillator (VCO) and injection locked frequency divider (ILFD) special for the Ka-band frequency synthesizer in 130-nm CMOS technology. The VCO core consists of a NMOS-only cross-coupled pair for negative resistance generation and a varactor for frequency tuning. The ILFD is based on hybrid differential injection technique with combining the tail-and the direct injectors. The simulated frequency tuning range (FTR) of the VCO increases from 26.6 GHz to 28.2 GHz as the tuning voltage increases from 0 to 1.2 V. Post simulation shows the VCO and ILFD achieved the phase noise of -97.2 dBc/Hz and -103.2 dBc/Hz respectively at 1 MHz offset. The VCO and ILFD consume 12 mW and 4 mW of power respectively from 1.2 V supply voltage.