A high linearity folded cascode Low Noise Amplifier for wireless receivers

In wireless receivers, linearity is one of the performance metrics that needs to be addressed while designing LNAs. Modified Derivative Superposition (MDS) technique is one of the methods proposed in the literature to improve linearity. In the literature, Folded Cascode (FC) Low Noise Amplifiers (LNA) are proposed for low voltage and low power Radio Frequency Integrated Circuits (RFIC). In this paper, FC LNA adapting MDS technique (FC-MDS) is designed and implemented using UMC 0.13 μm RFCMOS process to operate at 900 MHz. From the simulation results, it is found that the proposed FC-MDS LNA achieves a Power Gain of 13.7 dB, Noise Figure of 1.1 dB, IIP3 of +7.77 dBm, and the S11 of -27dB. The designed LNA consumes 6.19 mW power. The Figure of Merit of the proposed LNA is higher by a factor of 1.2 to 6.5 than those of other cascode LNAs reported in the literature.