60GHz-Pulse Detector Based on CMOS Nonlinear Amplifier

A low-power over-Gbps wireless pulse communication is realized at the 60 GHz band. To detect 60 GHz pulses in a receiver, a single-ended MESFET detector or a diode was conventionally used. However, the MESFET detector cannot be integrated on the silicon substrate with the CMOS building blocks of the receiver and a diode is unavailable in general design rules. To overcome this issue, a common-source amplifier, utilizing a square-law relationship between the drain current I_d and the gate voltage V₂ of an NMOSFET, is proposed as a detector. A nonlinear amplifier (NLA) using a standard 90 nm CMOS process is designed and fabricated. It has a voltage responsivity of 1110 mV/mW and power dissipation of 840 muW. The results show that, using the proposed NLA, it is possible to design low-cost, over-Gbps, low-power fully CMOS-compatible and compact 60 GHz receiver systems.