Development of Wideband and High IIP3 Millimeter-Wave Mixers

Abstract

This paper presents the design and development of highly linear, wide bandwidth mixers. We propose a linearization technique that combines the optimum drain bias condition and multiple-gated transistors for resistive mixers. An on-chip three-line edge-coupled Marchand balun is designed to have low phase and amplitude imbalance for canceling out the even order intermodulation products. Two mixer prototypes: a single-balanced (SB) mixer and a double-balanced (DB) mixer are designed to prove the concepts. The experimental results demonstrate that the SB prototype mixer has a measured conversion loss of less than 11 dB and third-order input intercept point (IIP3) range of 27–33 dBm at 15-dBm LO drive from 7 to 34 GHz. The DB mixer exhibits a conversion loss of less than 11 dB and IIP3 range of 31–35 dBm from 7–26 GHz at 17-dBm LO drive. Both prototypes achieve a high port-to-port isolation of over 30 dB within the operation bandwidth. To the best of our knowledge, the mixers have the highest linearity over the widest bandwidth ever reported.