A new method to stabilize high frequency high gain CMOS LNA

Abstract

A new technique to improve stability of high frequency high gain CMOS Low Noise Amplifiers (LNA) has been introduced. A 0.18 /spl mu/m CMOS LNA for WLAN 5.2 GHz is designed and its performance is compared to typical CMOS cascode LNA for the same frequency. New filter architecture at load has caused a sharp notch in "in-band" S12 of the LNA. This method significantly increases the stability of the LNA while benefits from the high forward gain (16.6 dB) and low noise figure (1.4 dB) of the cascode topology. New LNA shows input IP3 of 0.6dBm while consumes 9mA out of 1.8V supply voltage.