W-band GaN power amplifier MMICs

Author

Brown, Andrew ; Brown, Ken ; Chen, James ; Hwang, K.C. ; Kolias, Nick ; Scott, Rick

fYear

2011

fDate

5-10 June 2011

Firstpage

1

Lastpage

4

Abstract

An advanced high power, high frequency GaN semiconductor process has made possible the design and fabrication of W-band power amplifier MMICs with unprecedented performance. The key enabling semiconductor technology is a 150 nm T-gate GaN HEMT with an output power exceeding 300 mW and a peak PAE (power added efficiency) of 37%. With this process, W-band power amplifier MMICs have been designed and fabricated that demonstrate output powers of 1.7 watts, power added efficiencies greater than 20%, and small signal gains of 21 dB. In addition, the compactness of these MMIC designs have allowed for MMIC power densities (MMIC output power relative to MMIC area) exceeding 1/2 watt/mm².

Keywords

III-V semiconductors; MMIC power amplifiers; gallium compounds; high electron mobility transistors; millimetre wave power amplifiers; wide band gap semiconductors; GaN; HEMT; W-band; gain 21 dB; high frequency semiconductor process; power added efficiency; power amplifier MMIC; semiconductor technology; size 150 nm; Gain; Gallium nitride; MMICs; Power amplifiers; Power generation; Power measurement; Testing; Millimeter wave integrated circuits; W-band; gallium nitride; power amplifiers;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Microwave Symposium Digest (MTT), 2011 IEEE MTT-S International

Conference_Location

Baltimore, MD

ISSN

0149-645X

Print_ISBN

978-1-61284-754-2

Electronic_ISBN

0149-645X

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/MWSYM.2011.5972571

Filename

5972571