Design of an incoherent IR-UWB receiver front-end in 180-nm CMOS technology

A novel low-complexity RF front-end circuit for impulseradio ultra-wideband (IR-UWB) receiver based on non-coherent communication was presented. The RF front-end includes a wideband low noise amplifier (LNA), a correlator, an integrator and a comparator. The RF front-end circuit is implemented in a 0.18-μm CMOS technology, consuming 35.1 mW under 1.8V. The wideband input impedance matching of LNA is conducted by employing an RC feedback network and a degenerating inductor. A Gilbert mixer is used as the correlator. A current injection technology is used to improve the gain and linearity of the mixer. The simulation results show that: the noise figure (NF) of the LNA is from 2.6 to 3.1 dB and the reflected coefficient (S₁₁) <; -10 dB, covering standard UWB low band of 3~5 GHz. The average power gain (S₂₁) of LNA is about 16.8 dB. The mixer gets a conversion gain of 15.01 dB and its input 3_rd order intercept point (IIP3) is -3.47 dBm. The designed receiver front-end can correctly demodulate IR-UWB signals with a data rate of 50Mbps under a power of -90dBm.