Design and experimental results of a 2V-operation single-chip GaAs T/R-MMIC front-end for 1.9-GHz personal communications

Design and experimental results of a 2-V operation single-chip GaAs T/R-MMIC front-end are described for 1.9-GHz personal communication terminals. This chip, fabricated with planar self-aligned gate FET process useful for low-cost and high-volume production, integrates RF front-end analog circuits-a power amplifier, a T/R-switch, and a low-noise amplifier. Additionally integrated are a newly designed voltage doubler-negative voltage generator (VDNVG) and a control logic circuit to control transmit and receive functions. The chip is capable of delivering 21-dBm output power at 39 % efficiency with 2-V single power supply in transmit mode. By utilizing up-voltage and negative voltages generated from the generator, the new interface circuit enables the switch to handle high power outputs over 24 dBm with 0.55-dB insertion loss