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Design of an integrated mm-wave front-end for spctrum monitoring applications

Author Larry Theran
Faculty Mentors Rafael Rodríguez Solís
active
Start Date Nov 01, 2022
End Date Nov 01, 2024

This project consists in the development of a millimeter-wave receiver front-end, characterized by its Size, Weight, and Power plus Cost (SWaP-C) requirements. The front-end encompasses a low-noise amplifier and a self-oscillating mixer that will be seamlessly integrated with the antenna system. For the receiver design, a MMIC PH15 process based on a 0.15 microns gate Pseudomorphic High Electron Mobility Transistors (0.15 microns P-HEMT) technology from UMS has been selected. This is a type of field-effect transistor (FET) commonly used in high-frequency and have been shown to be ideal for the design of low-noise amplifiers (LNAs). The cascode topology was selected for the LNA, which makes it unconditional stable. Through parameter optimization, we successfully designed a Low Noise Amplifier (LNA) with a peak gain of 8.4 dB for single stage and noise figure of 0.75 dB. Additionally, a Voltage- Controlled Oscillator (VCO) was designed using the varactor diode model to generate frequencies with a bandwidth of 10 GHz. The subsequent phase involves integrating the VCO with the mixer in a current reuse topology. These advanced receiver systems are specifically tailored for employment within distributed spectrum monitoring systems, as well as integrated arrays designed for the purpose of interference mitigation.

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