A 1-V 45-GHz Balanced Amplifier With 21.5-dB Gain Using 0.18-$\mu{\hbox {m}}$ CMOS Technology

Abstract

A fully integrated balanced amplifier was realized in a standard 0.18-mum CMOS technology. From the measured-parameters, a gain up to 21.5 dB was achieved at 45.4 GHz under a supply voltage of only 1 V and a total power consumption of 89 mW. An effective technique, i.e., pi-type parallel resonance, was proposed to enhance the device and circuit frequency response. In addition, the semicoaxial line structure was used to reduce the signal loss and physical size of the Lange couplers in the amplifier. To the best of the authors' knowledge, the proposed balanced amplifier demonstrated the highest operation frequency and the lowest operation voltage among the published millimeter-wave amplifiers using a similar technology.