Development of microwave multilayer plastic-based multichip modules

Author

Pham, Anh-Vu H. ; Sutono, Albert ; Laskar, Joy ; Krishnamurthy, V. ; Lester, D. ; Balch, E. ; Rose, J.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. & Comput. Eng., Clemson Univ., SC, USA

Volume

24

Issue

1

fYear

2001

fDate

2/1/2001 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

37

Lastpage

40

Abstract

We present the design and development of multilayer plastic-based multichip modules (MCM) at microwave frequencies. A vertical feed-through interconnect, which consists of embedded copper wires in plastic, has been developed to transport RF/microwave and dc signals from the first to the second packaging level. The development of this vertical feed-through enables plastic modules to be configured in a surface mount topology that can be interfaced with low cost FR-4 boards using ball grid arrays (BGA). The experimental analysis results demonstrate that this vertical feed-through used with BGAs has ultra-low parasitics and achieves a return loss of greater than 20-dB at 4-GHz. In addition, we demonstrate a number of packaged active microwave circuits including a switch, a low noise amplifier (LNA) and a power amplifier using the plastic module technology at microwave frequencies

Keywords

MMIC; ball grid arrays; integrated circuit interconnections; integrated circuit packaging; multichip modules; multilayers; plastic packaging; surface mount technology; 20 dB; 4 GHz; Cu; FR-4 board; active microwave circuit; ball grid array; embedded copper wire; low noise amplifier; microwave multilayer plastic multichip module; packaging; parasitics; power amplifier; return loss; surface mount topology; switch; vertical feedthrough interconnect; Copper; Integrated circuit interconnections; Low-noise amplifiers; Microwave amplifiers; Microwave frequencies; Multichip modules; Nonhomogeneous media; Plastic packaging; Switches; Wires;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Advanced Packaging, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

1521-3323

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/6040.909623

Filename

909623