A CMOS Dual-mode High-dynamic-range Wideband Receiver RF Front-end

Abstract

A dual-mode wideband high-dynamic-range receiver RF front-end consisting mainly of a low-noise amplifier (LNA) and a mixer is presented and implemented in standard 0.18 μm CMOS technology. Besides wideband input matching, the wideband LNA is optimized purposefully for low NF and high gain, and the mixer for high linearity and proper gain. In high-gain (HG) mode, with the LNA involved, the high sensitivity can be achieved; in low-gain (LG) mode, with the LNA bypassed, the mixer stands out and makes the front-end exhibit high linearity. In an overall view, the proposed dual-mode wideband RF front-end achieves a high dynamic range. With an occupied die area of 2360 μm× 1460 μm and a single supply voltage of 1.8V, measurement results show the dual-mode RF frontend can operate across the desired frequency range of 1.3 ~ 2 GHz and achieve gain of 20 dB and NF of 4.8dB in the HG mode, and average IIP3 of 8 dBm and P1dB of -4 dB in the LG mode, respectively.