Highly linear 1.6 GHz 3.3V RF power amplifier using floating body technique in triple-well 130 nm CMOS technology

Power amplifiers (PAs) in CMOS technology have drawn considerable interest for meeting 4^th generation (4 G) wireless standards due to their low cost and high level of integration. At increasing power levels, (around 1 W), it becomes challenging to meet the linearity constraints. In this paper, we investigate a differential common source class-AB RF PA employing floating body and compare it with a body-source shorted version. We use triple-well NMOS RF devices at 1.6 GHz in 130nm CMOS technology. Linearity is improved for the floating body based amplifier in terms of AM/PM and 3^rd order intermodulation (IMD₃) suppression by 1.8° and 1.5 dBc at P_1dB as compared to a body-source shorted amplifier. The linearity is evident over all output power (P_out) levels. The linear gain is reduced by 0.42 dB due to increased coupling between drain and source terminals while the PAE is increased by 1.6% at P_1dB for floating body based amplifier.