A ultrawideband 3–10 GHz low-noise amplifier MMIC using inductive-series peaking technique

Abstract

The objective of this paper was to investigate that the ultrawideband (UWB) low noise amplifier (LNA) was carried out by utilizing a two-stage cascade circuit schematic associated with inductive-series peaking technique, which could improve the bandwidth in the 3-10 GHz microwave monolithic integrated circuit (MMIC). The proposed UWB LNA amplifier was implemented with both co-planar waveguide (CPW) layout and 0.15-μm GaAs D-mode pHEMT technology. Based on those technologies, this proposed UWB LNA which the chip size was shown of 1.5 mm × 1.4 mm, obtained a flatness gain 3-dB bandwidth of 4-8 GHz, the constant gain of 4 dB, noise figure lower than 5 dB, and the return loss better than -8.5 dB of input matching. Based on our experimental results, the low noise amplifier using the inductive-series peaking technique could obtain the wider band-width, low power consumption and high flatness of gain in the 3-10 GHz. Finally, the overall LNA characterization exhibited ultra-wide band-width and low noise characterization, which illustrated that the proposed UWB LNA had the circuit compact size and exhibited favorable RF characteristics. This UWB LNA circuit demonstrated the high RF characterization and could provide for the low noise microwave circuit applications.