Analysis and Implementation of Harmonic Injection Locking in Cross-Coupled Oscillators Exploiting Inter-Harmonic Translations

Abstract

This paper proposes a new approach to above- <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$f_{max}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> power detection, using harmonic injection locking of a cross-coupled oscillator and the resulting change in oscillation amplitude. The paper starts with the development of a theoretical framework for this receiver. Two previous methodologies are combined: analyzing an injection-locked oscillator as an active device in a positive feedback loop with a frequency selective network; and the more recently proposed way of modeling non-linearities by using inter-harmonic translation coefficients. Using this framework, a compact equation for the expected voltage response of the receiver is derived. Finally, the design of a receiver consisting of a 200 GHz cross-coupled oscillator with a 600 GHz folded dipole antenna as its tank inductor is discussed. A Noise Equivalent Power (NEP) of 2.3 pW/ <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\sqrt {\text {Hz}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> is achieved with the proposed receiver.