Spur Free Dynamic Range Prediction for Phased Array Receivers

Analytical techniques to determine the linearity and spur-free dynamic range (SFDR) for phased array receivers are presented. The proposed method eliminates the need for circuit-level simulation of intermodulation distortion in an N-element receiver by characterizing the array SFDR from the SFDR for a single receive channel. The analysis separates the relative impact of array factor, circuit architecture and channel linearity to assess the spatial sensitivity of the receiver to jamming signals. The proposed techniques are applied to a comparison of RF phase-shifting and LO phase-shifting receivers. RF phase-shifting architectures are shown to offer more uniform jammer rejection over the beam-scanning range given the same receiver linearity constraints.