A novel active variable gain X-Band amplifier in SiGe technology

Author

Corbière, Rémi ; Louis, Bruno ; Tartarin, Jean-Guy

Author_Institution

Thales Syst. Aeroportes, Elancourt, France

fYear

2010

fDate

23-28 May 2010

Firstpage

312

Lastpage

315

Abstract

In this paper, a new structure based on variable gain amplifiers (VGAs) in SiGe technology with high linearity (Pin1dB > 8 dBm) and high dynamic range (> 30 dB) under 3.3 V is presented. In this proposed technique, two VGAs and a passive attenuator are used to improve the linearity especially at high attenuation. The simulated gain errors are less than +/- 0.1 dB for a 0.5 dB step over the whole dynamic gain range (31.5 dB). The Pin1dB is better than 8 dBm at the maximum gain of 8 dB and better than 22 dBm above 16 dB of attenuation.

Keywords

Ge-Si alloys; amplifiers; attenuators; SiGe; SiGe technology; active variable gain X-band amplifier; gain error; high dynamic range; high linearity; passive attenuator; voltage 3.3 V; Attenuation; Attenuators; BiCMOS integrated circuits; Dynamic range; Gain; Germanium silicon alloys; Linearity; RF signals; Radio frequency; Silicon germanium; High linearity amplifiers; Monte-Carlo simulations; RF analog circuits; Silicon bipolar/BiCMOS process technology; Variable gain amplifiers (VGAs);

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Microwave Symposium Digest (MTT), 2010 IEEE MTT-S International

Conference_Location

Anaheim, CA

ISSN

0149-645X

Print_ISBN

978-1-4244-6056-4

Electronic_ISBN

0149-645X

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/MWSYM.2010.5515104

Filename

5515104