A CMOS triple-push 280-GHz VCO integrated with 1/16,384 divider chain

In this work, a 280-GHz VCO integrated with a frequency divider with a large division ratio is presented. The triple-push Colpitts VCO, fabricated in a 65-nm CMOS technology, showed a tuning range of 279.9-283.0 GHz (3.1 GHz). The divider chain consists of two injection-locked frequency dividers (ILFDs and twelve current-mode logic (CML) dividers With the total division ratio of 16,384, the divider chain successfully divided the fundamental frequency (f₀) of the VCO down to near 5.8 MHz. Total DC power consumption of the entire circuit was 131 mW.