A 100-element HBT grid amplifier

Author

Moonil Kim ; Sovero, E.A. ; Hacker, J.B. ; De Lisio, M.P. ; Jung-Chih Chiao ; Shi-Jie Li ; Gagnon, David R. ; Rosenberg, James J. ; Rutledge, David B.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. Eng., California Inst. of Technol., Pasadena, CA, USA

Volume

41

Issue

10

fYear

1993

fDate

10/1/1993 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

1762

Lastpage

1771

Abstract

A 100-element 10-GHz grid amplifier has been developed. The active devices in the grid are chips with heterojunction-bipolar-transistor (HBT) differential pairs. The metal grid pattern was empirically designed to provide effective coupling between the HBTs and free space. Two independent measurements, one with focusing lenses and the other without, were used to characterize the grid. In each case, the peak gain was 10 dB at 10 GHz with a 3-dB bandwidth of 1 GHz. The input and output return losses were better than 15 dB at 10 GHz. The maximum output power was 450 mW, and the minimum noise figure was 7 dB. By varying the bias, a signal could be amplitude modulated with a modulation index as large as 0.65. Tests show that the grid was quite tolerant of failures-the output power dropped by only 1 dB when 10% of the inputs were detuned. The grid amplifier is a multimode device that amplifies beams of different shapes and angles. Beams with incidence angles up to 30° were amplified with less than a 3-dB drop in gain

Keywords

MMIC; bipolar integrated circuits; differential amplifiers; microwave amplifiers; 10 GHz; 450 mW; 7 dB; HBT grid amplifier; focusing lenses; heterojunction-bipolar-transistor differential pairs; incidence angles; maximum output power; metal grid pattern; minimum noise figure; modulation index; multimode device; output power; peak gain; return losses; Amplitude modulation; Bandwidth; Gain; Heterojunction bipolar transistors; Lenses; Noise figure; Power amplifiers; Power generation; Semiconductor device measurement; Testing;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Microwave Theory and Techniques, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9480

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/22.247921

Filename

247921