A 71–73 GHz voltage-controlled standing-wave oscillator in 90 nm CMOS technology

In this contribution we present a standing-wave voltage controlled oscillator that is suitable for operation in the lower licensed E-band (i.e., 71-73 GHz). Frequency tuning is achieved by periodically loading a shielded differential transmission with inversion-mode varactors. An output buffer is introduced to facilitate on-chip probing. The oscillator is implemented in 90 nm CMOS technology. The core power consumption is 19 mW from a 1.2 V supply and area occupation is 120 times 80 mum². For a 72 GHz frequency, the oscillator exhibits a measured phase noise of -112.2 dBc/Hz at 10 MHz. The resulting figure-of-merit is -176.5 dBc/Hz.