Abstract
The demand for radio frequency (RF) transceivers operating at 2.4 GHz band has attracted considerable research interest due to the advancement in short range wireless technologies. The performance of RF transceivers depends heavily on the transmitter and receiver front-ends. The receiver front-end is comprised of a low-noise amplifier (LNA) and a downconversion mixer. There are very few designs that focus on connecting the single-ended output LNA to a double-balanced mixer without the use of on-chip transformer, also known as a balun. The objective of designing such a receiver front-end is to achieve high integration and low power consumption. To meet these requirements, we present the design of fully-integrated 2.4 GHz receiver front-end, consisting of a narrow-band LNA and a double balanced mixer without using a balun. Here, the single-ended RF output signal of the LNA is translated into differential signal using an NMOS-PMOS (n-channel metal-oxide-semiconductor, p-channel metal-oxide-semiconductor) transistor differential pair instead of the conventional NMOS-NMOS transistor configuration, for the RF amplification stage of the double-balanced mixer. The proposed receiver circuit fabricated using TSMC 0.18 µm CMOS technology operates at 2.4 GHz and produces an output signal at 300 MHz. The fabricated receiver achieves a gain of 16.3 dB and consumes only 6.74 mW operating at 1.5 V, while utilizing 2.08 mm2 of chip area. Measurement results demonstrate the effectiveness and suitability of the proposed receiver for short-range wireless applications, such as in wireless sensor network (WSN).
Highlights
The demand for short-range wireless transceivers operating in the 2.4 GHz ISM (Industrial, Scientific and Medical) band, widely used in emerging ultra low-power applications, such as autonomous wireless sensor networks (WSNs) for different monitoring applications [1,2,3], Internet-of-Things (IoT)
The radio frequency (RF) transceiver is a critical block in a wireless system as it consumes more than 80% of the total power of the system
The receiver RF front-end of a transceiver is of particular interest to many researchers as it is a critical block that consumes a significant fraction of the power
Summary
The demand for short-range wireless transceivers operating in the 2.4 GHz ISM (Industrial, Scientific and Medical) band, widely used in emerging ultra low-power applications, such as autonomous wireless sensor networks (WSNs) for different monitoring applications [1,2,3], Internet-of-Things (IoT). The differential narrowband LNA doubles the number of stages as compared to the conventional LNA, which consumes twice the power and degrades the performance of the narrowband receiver Another possible solution for implementing a single input narrowband LNA followed by a double balanced mixer is to use an on-chip transformer [16]. This solution is not effective, since many components need to be integrated in order to implement an on-chip transformer, which will result in an increase in chip area. NMOS-NMOS transistors [18], for the RF amplification stage of the double balanced mixer This design achieves the single-ended LNA to double balanced mixer connection without the need for an on-chip transformer, while at the same time keeping the performance characteristics at competitive levels.
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