A V-band radio receiver integrating LTCC SoP module with a fully embedded LPF for wireless applications

This paper describes the design techniques and measurement results of a V-band LTCC SoP module with fully embedded Low Pass Filter (LPF). A compact size was achieved by combining the special features of LTCC technology and a direct conversion ASK receiver architecture. The LTCC technology offer the means to integrate active and passive components on compact modules (multilayer substrates) for mmWave wireless applications. The low loss characteristics of the LTCC dielectric and conductor at the mmWave frequency, allow low loss transmission lines and high quality factor passive devices to be employed. The 5^th Order LPF was designed and fully embedded in this LTCC SoP module. The envelope detector was employed to evade the LO circuit from the system. Thus, the size has significantly reduced. The LTCC SoP module with size of 1.8cm × 6.9cm was successfully fabricated and integrated with other components to produce a complete radio receiver module for gigabit-rate wireless applications. The measured result of the radio receiver module shows the baseband range of 1.25GHz, typical output level of 0.4V_P-P, 1.25Gbps data-rate and BER less than 10^-12 for 40dB dynamic range.