Cascade Amplifier Research Articles

Analysis of Gain Enhancement Techniques in Integrated Circuit Design

Abstract. Today, the size of semiconductor devices is still decreasing, which makes the circuit more integrated, faster computing speed, and lower power consumption. But for a single transistor, some performance degrades. One of the important properties is voltage gain, which must be compensated with some special methods in the design. This paper will focus on the discussion and analysis of four methods, which are able to improve the voltage gain. These are cascode amplifier, cascade amplifier, gain boosting, and bootstrapping. In this letter, their respective advantages and disadvantages will be discussed. Furthermore current applications and possible external development of these methods are also important part of this paper. In this part, the discussion will be further expanded and summarized on the basis of previous studies. Hopefully, these studies can help others gain a more comprehensive understanding of these technologies and provide a theoretical basis for future high-performance analog integrated operational amplifier research and design.

Hollow Calcium/Copper Bimetallic Amplifier for Cuproptosis/Paraptosis/Apoptosis Cancer Therapy via Cascade Reinforcement of Endoplasmic Reticulum Stress and Mitochondrial Dysfunction.

The endoplasmic reticulum (ER) and mitochondria are essential organelles that play crucial roles in maintaining cellular homeostasis. The simultaneous induction of ER stress and mitochondrial dysfunction represents a promising yet challenging strategy for cancer treatment. Herein, a hollow calcium-copper bimetallic nanoplatform is developed as a cascade amplifier to reinforce ER stress and mitochondrial dysfunction for breast cancer treatment. For this purpose, we report a facile method for preparing hollow CaCO3 (HCC) nanoparticles by regulating the dissolution-recrystallization process of amorphous CaCO3, and the amplifier D@HCC-CuTH is meticulously fabricated by sequentially coating disulfiram-loaded HCC nanoparticles with a copper coordination polymer and hyaluronan. In tumor cells, the dithiocarbamate-copper complex generated in situ by liberated disulfiram and Cu2+ inhibits the ubiquitin-proteasome system, causing irreversible ER stress and intracellular Ca2+ redistribution. Meanwhile, the amplifier induces mitochondrial dysfunction via triggering a self-amplifying loop of mitochondrial Ca2+ burst, and reactive oxygen species augment. Additionally, Cu2+ induces dihydrolipoamide S-acetyltransferase oligomerization in mitochondria, further exacerbating mitochondrial damage via cuproptosis. Collectively, ER stress amplification and mitochondrial dysfunction synergistically induce a cuproptosis-paraptosis-apoptosis trimodal cell death pathway, which demonstrates significant efficacy in suppressing tumor growth. This study presents a paradigm for synchronously inducing subcellular organelle disorders to boost cancer multimodal therapy.

High voltage formation using the amplifiers cascading method

The dividing of high voltage broadband non-inverting cascade amplifiers into separate cascades, each of which has independent power sources, is suggested. These cascades are connected to one another in series, switching on the operational amplifiers and the feedback links. The gain of each cascade is determined by the non-inverting scheme of feedback that assures accurate signal processing. To provide stable and effective functioning, the operational amplifiers are supplied with power from transistor repeaters. That assures the required feeding voltage levels. Due to the thorough selection of the gain factor and feeding source voltage, the amplifier system achieves the expended output voltage range.

Development of an H2 fuel cell electrochemical system powered by Escherichia coli cells

Because of the growing high importance of the development of biocatalytic fuel cell (FC) technologies for renewable energy-producing and testing systems for medical or environmental purposes, in this study, we constructed and demonstrated an H2 FC voltammeter working with graphite sample testing micro-strips and based on Escherichia coli microbial cells. Presented H2 FC voltammeter that provides fast and precise testing of bio-electrochemical possible reactions in biosamples for H2 and other gases, is automated with software which works in NI LabVIEW programming environment, has amplifier cascade system with high internal resistance, temperature controlling and resistance cascade. Microbial Hydrogenase (Hyd) enzymes reversibly catalyze the formation and oxidation of H2. Isolation and characterization of O2-tolerant [NiFe]-hydrogenases (Hyds) have given rise to new concepts in H2 FC. Escherichia coli and [NiFe]-Hyds can be applied as a biocatalyst anode in biofuel cells (BFCs). We evaluated the efficiency of applying the 3 µl (1.5 mg cell dry weight) E. coli intact cells or crude extracts on 0.5 cm2 as anode catalyzers in the bio-electrochemical system. The highest electrical potential (up to 0.7 V) was achieved with bacterial whole cells, which were grown on glucose and glycerol.

A low-noise, radiation-hardened charge-sensitive amplifier for Silicon carbide neutron detector

Silicon carbide(SiC) neutron detectors can be applied to extreme environments with high temperature and strong radiation. The total noise factor is most significantly influenced by the noise factor of the first stage in a cascade amplifier. Hence, the preamplifier must exhibit exceptional noise performance. The readout circuit is inevitably exposed to the influence of radiation, which may result in temporary or even permanent failure of electronic systems. The connection method between the SiC neutron detector and the readout circuit is typically DC-coupled. When the sensor is working, the leakage current generated by the sensor will enter the input end of the CSA and change the baseline position of the CSA. In this paper, a low-noise CSA with leakage current compensation circuit(LCC) is presented. The circuit’s voltage-to-charge amplification is 2.98mV/fC, and the error due to nonlinearity is below 0.01%. Without considering the input parasitic capacitance, ENC is 43.12e-. In addition, the circuit also has good radiation resistance and leakage current compensation function. It is implemented and simulated in the DB Hitek 0.18μm CMOS process model.

2–26.5 GHz GaN ultra‐wideband amplifier with over 2 W output power

AbstractA 2–26.5GHz broadband amplifier monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) based on the 0.15 μm GaN high electron mobility transistor process has been developed. The broadband amplifier adopts a two‐stage distributed amplifier cascade structure, which improves the gain of the broadband amplifier. Further, the capacitive coupling is used to improve the gain bandwidth product of the power amplifier. To improve the output return loss of the wideband amplifier, a tuning stub is introduced at the output of the circuit. The on‐wafer measurement results show that the amplifier has a gain greater than 18 dB, gain flatness less than ±1.4 dB, and saturated output power >35 dBm with a >13% power added efficiency in the whole band.

Dynamic Range of a Digital Radio Receiver with a Photonic Analog-to-Digital Converter

The article is devoted to determining the requirements for the preliminary, analog part of the receiver and its structure when using a photonic ADC. The subject of research in this case is the issues of ensuring a large dynamic range of signals at the input of a receiver with a photonic ADC. The parameters and properties of the PADC with optical quantization and discretization are investigated. The distinctive features of the PADC are a high sampling rate, about 100 GHz, the possibility of increasing the carrier-to-noise ratio (CNR) and the effective number of bits (ENOB) due to the amplification of the carrier or modulating signal, and a low noise factor of microwave photonic elements. The presented advantages make it possible to reduce the structure of the analog part of the receiver by eliminating the mixer and anti-aliasing filter, as well as to achieve better sensitivity due to a lower level of internal noise. The study also revealed a limitation of the dynamic range imposed by the photonic element base. The reason for the limitation is the nonlinearity of the electro-optical modulators used and the limitation of the upper limit of the dynamic range to the photodetectors used. All this leads to requirements under which the analog part must provide significant amplification of the received radio signal, as well as the implementation of a variable gain. As a result, structural solutions are presented in the form of multichannel switching circuits. The principle of operation lies in the fact that each channel, consisting of a cascade of linear amplifiers and a PADC, has a different gain, and in the digital processing unit, channels are compared and switched depending on the signal level. At the same time, the level should be in the 'corridor' of acceptable values for the application of the PADC and within the dynamic range. The presented structural solutions will make it possible to implement radio receivers capable of receiving and processing a microwave signal without transferring the signal to an intermediate frequency. At the same time, the required signal amplification level of 105 - 106 can be achieved, which makes it possible to achieve a signal level of 2.5-9.5 V, at which the photonic analog-to-digital converter has the best CNR and ENOB indicators.

A 39/48 GHz Switchless Reconfigurable Low Noise Amplifier Using Common Gate and Coupled-Line-Based Diplexer

This paper presents a switchless dual-band low-noise amplifier (LNA) that can be reconfigured to include n260 (37.40 GHz) and n262 (47.2.48.2 GHz) millimeter-wave (mm-Wave) dual bands. The proposed reconfigurable LNA is designed to separate and isolate two bands, using a common gate and coupled-line-based diplexer for the inter-stage of cascade amplifiers. A common gate amplifier has the advantage of simultaneously selecting the signal path and amplifying the signal power according to a band, using an impedance variation between the gon/offh conditions of gate bias. In addition, the coupled-line-based diplexer can be optimized to exhibit high isolation characteristics between frequencies using high and low-pass characteristics. The designed reconfigurable LNA is fabricated with the 0.15–μm GaAs pHEMT process. With the high frequency (HF) mode, the reconfigurable LNA achieves a measured gain of 19.2 dB at the center frequency, noise figure, and OP1dB of 48 GHz, 4.8 dB, and 6.88 dBm, respectively. In the low frequency (LF) mode, the reconfigurable LNA exhibits a measured gain of 24.8 dB at the center frequency, noise figure, and OP1dB of 39 GHz, 3.9 dB, and 6.80 dBm, respectively. The chip occupies a core area of 3.04 mm2, which consumes 61.4 mW and 64.7 mW in the HF and LF modes, respectively.

MODELING OF A DIGITAL COMMUNICATION SYSTEM WITH INTERFERENCE-RESISTANT CODING OVER DELAYED MULTIPATH CHANNELS FOR A FIXED WIRELESS ACCESS SYSTEM


 
 
 In this study, an analysis of the performance of a digital communication system was conducted to improve the efficiency of the communication channel. The system was de- signed and evaluated in the MatLab/Simulink environment, specifically for the transmission of binary data in a multipath channel with static fading. One of the main advantages of this system is its ability to provide high noise immunity, even in the presence of noise, interference, and signal delays. The performance of the system was investigated in terms of bit error rate (BER) over both an additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channel and a multipath Rayleigh fading channel. The study also considered the impact of inter-symbol interference (ISI) and explored different parameters for a static channel, resembling a wireless LAN system based on IEEE 802.11 (as defined by Rec ITU-R M.1225). This study uses a solution to suppress inter-symbol interference using cascading coding (convolutional turbo codes with Reed Solo- mon code), Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) and Inverse Fast Fourier Transform (IFFT), amplifiers at the transmitter side and normalizer at the receiver side, by regulating the amplification ratios of transmitter and receiver sides. Modeling of a digital communication system for a wide-band fixed wireless LAN system (for Indoor office and Outdoor to indoor systems) has been performed. The modeling outcomes show that the applied method provides a good per- formance improvement in channels with ISI with static fading.
 The application of cascading coding (turbo code together with RS code), amplifiers, and FFT on the transmitter side, and IFFT on the receiver side will eliminate the effects of inter-symbol interference on digital signals in a multipath channel with static fading (as defined by Rec. ITU-R M.1225 for internal and external transmission systems) for wireless fixed systems.
 
 

Modulation of Autophagy Direction to Enhance Antitumor Effect of Endoplasmic-Reticulum-Targeted Therapy: Left or Right?

Strategies that induce dysfunction in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) hold great promise for anticancer therapy, but remain unsatisfactory due to the compensatory autophagy induction after ER disruption. Moreover, as autophagy can either promote or suppress cell survival, which direction of autophagy better suits ER-targeting therapy remains controversial. Here, a targeted nanosystem is constructed, which efficiently escorts anticancer therapeutics into the ER, triggering substantial ER stress and autophagy. Concurrently, an autophagy enhancer or inhibitor is combined into the same nanoparticle, and their impacts on ER-related activities are compared. In the orthotopic breast cancer mouse model, the autophagy enhancer increases the antimetastasis effect of ER-targeting therapy and suppresses over 90% of cancer metastasis, while the autophagy inhibitor has a bare effect. Mechanism studies reveal that further enhancing autophagy accelerates central protein snail family transcriptional repressor 1 (SNAI1) degradation, suppressing downstream epithelial-mesenchymal transition, while inhibiting autophagy does the opposite. With the same trend, ER-targeting therapy combined with an autophagy enhancer provokes stronger immune response and tumor inhibition than the autophagy inhibitor. Mechanism studies reveal that the autophagy enhancer elevates Ca2+ release from the ER and functions as a cascade amplifier of ER dysfunction, which accelerates Ca2+ release, resulting in immunogenic cell death (ICD) induction and eventually triggering immune responses. Together, ER-targeting therapy benefits from the autophagy-enhancing strategy more than the autophagy-inhibiting strategy for antitumor and antimetastasis treatment.

Quantitative Analysis of Mitochondrial RNA in Living Cells with a Dual-Color Imaging System.

Accurate quantification and dynamic expression profiling of mitochondrial RNA (mtRNA for short) are critical for illustrating their cellular functions. However, there lack methods for precise detection of mtRNA in situ due to the delivery restrictions and complicated cellular interferences. Herein, a dual-color imaging system featured with signal amplification and normalization capability for quantitative analysis of specific mtRNA is established. As a proof-of-concept example, an enzyme-free hairpin DNA cascade amplifier fine-tailored to specifically recognize mtRNA encoding NADH dehydrogenase subunit 6 (ND6) is employed as the signal output module and integrated into the biodegradable mitochondria-targeting black phosphorus nanosheet (BP-PEI-TPP) to monitor spatial-temporal dynamics of ND6 mtRNA. An internal reference module targeting β-actin mRNA is sent to the cytoplasm via BP-PEI for signal normalization, facilitating mtRNA quantification inside living cells with a degree of specificity and sensitivity as high as reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR). With negligible cytotoxicity, this noninvasive "RT-qPCR mimic" can accurately indicate target mtRNA levels across different cells, providing a new strategy for precise analysis of subcellular RNAs in living systems.

Improvement of a highly sensitive and specific whole-cell biosensor by adding a positive feedback amplifier

In this study, we designed a Cd2+ whole-cell biosensor with both positive and negative feedback cascade amplifiers in Pseudomonas putida KT2440 (LTCM) based on our previous design with only a negative feedback amplifier (TCM). The results showed that the newly developed biosensor LTCM was greatly improved compared to TCM. Firstly, the linear response range of LTCM was expanded while the maximum linear response range was raised from 0.05 to 0.1 μM. Meanwhile, adding a positive feedback amplifier further increased the fluorescence output signal of LTCM 1.11–2.64 times under the same culture conditions. Moreover, the response time of LTCM for detection of practical samples was reduced from 6 to 4 h. At the same time, LTCM still retained very high sensitivity and specificity, while its lowest detection limit was 0.1 nM Cd2+ and the specificity was 23.29 (compared to 0.1 nM and 17.55 in TCM, respectively). In summary, the positive and negative feedback cascade amplifiers effectively improved the performance of the biosensor LTCM, resulting in a greater linear response range, higher output signal intensity, and shorter response time than TCM while retaining comparable sensitivity and specificity, indicating better potential for practical applications.

Using iMTGSPICE to Optimize Cascaded Miller OTAs and Boost Electrical Performance, Robustness and Reduce Die Area

Analog designers usually cascade several basic analog building blocks that were previously optimized to increase the open-loop voltage gain (AV0) and to avoid the increasing of the Design and Optimization Cycle Time (DOCT) of a given System-On-a-Chip. However, still exist a big doubt about if this approach is really better than that considering the implementation of amplifiers in cascade, without considering previously optimized analog building blocks. Thus, the main objective of this paper is to perform a detailed comparative study between robust amplifiers in cascade implemented without using analog building blocks previously designed and optimized and a similar one that uses analog building blocks previously designed and optimized (typical design approach). The computational design and optimization tool, named iMTGSPICE, which uses heuristics algorithms of the Artificial Intelligence integrated to the expertise of the analog designers (Human Intelligence), is used to perform these implementations to remarkably reduce DOCT of these implementations. This work demonstrates that it is possible to reduce the total gate area (44.6%) and to increase the operating temperature range from 0oC to 36oC to -40oC to 125oC of the robust amplifier in cascade that was implemented without using analog building blocks previously designed and optimized compared to one that was implemented by using analog building blocks previously designed and optimized.

Front-end electronics for silicon strip trackers: Architectures and evolution

Tracking detectors based on segmented semiconductor sensors have been present in high-energy physics experiments for more than 40 years. The development of these sensors was always strongly linked to advances in CMOS technologies that offer features supporting the design of specialized ASICs for readout purposes. While in the beginning, the front-end electronics only provided simple signal reception and amplification, sending out the raw analog data, growing demands from the experiments lead designers to begin directly integrating more advanced features for data processing and storage, power management, calibration functions, amongst others, on-chip. This development was, and continues to be, possible due to CMOS technology evolution, in particular the scaling. Besides higher speed and better transconductance, today’s sub-micron processes offer intrinsic ionizing radiation tolerance which, together with Single Event Effect (SEE) hardening techniques, allows design for reliable operation in a harsh radiation environment. Despite the enhanced functionality and greater number of transistors, higher time resolution and, in consequence, faster analog shaping and readout speed, the power consumption of typical front-end electronics measured per area of tracking detector remains of the order of a few tens of mW per square centimeter. The basic architecture of the input stage has also remained practically the same over the last 40 years. The optimal solution providing wide bandwidth and high open-loop gain at minimum power is the cascode: a cascade of common-source and common-gate amplifiers. Although each particular implementation differs slightly depending on the specific requirements and process used, the core of the preamplifier remains the same since its conception.

A 6–12 GHz wideband low‐noise amplifier GaAs FET design with 0.8‐dB average NF and 25‐dB gain

AbstractLow‐noise amplifiers (LNAs) with low‐noise performance are critical components in communication systems. However, reaching a high level of performance is difficult. This study introduces a LNA for radio frequency front‐end receivers with a frequency range of 6–12 GHz. The planned LNA contains a two‐stage high‐electron‐mobility transistor cascade amplifier with a minimum measured noise figure of 0.8 dB and a peak gain of 25 dB at room temperature. The proposed LNA is based on a gallium arsenide field‐effect transistor transistor (CE3512K2) because of its good low‐noise performance at microwave frequency bands. The measured results demonstrate that the proposed LNA is perfectly matched over the whole operational frequency spectrum of the input/output ports (|S11|<−10 dB, |S22|<−10 dB). Also, output P1dB and input P1dB are, respectively, +4 and −19 dBm for this design. The suggested LNA is suitable for C and X frequency band applications.

Proof-of-Concept of Millimeter-Wave RF Beamforming Transmitter Architecture Employing Frequency-Multiplier-Based Up-Converters

This letter proposes a millimeter-wave (mm-wave) RF beamforming transmitter (TX) architecture that employs frequency multipliers (FMs) as frequency up-converters to avoid the challenges associated with the signal and local oscillator (LO) distribution networks that intensify with the increase of operating frequency. The proposed architecture incorporates a single-input– single-output (SISO) digital predistortion (DPD) scheme that is specifically devised to mitigate the nonlinear distortions exhibited by the cascade of FMs and power amplifiers (PAs). Proof-of-concept experiments conducted on a lineup, comprised of an off-the-shelf frequency doubler and an <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$8\times 8$ </tex-math></inline-formula> array and operating at an output frequency of 28 GHz, confirmed the capacity of the proposed architecture to transmit 200 MHz orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) signals with an error vector magnitude (EVM) and adjacent channel power ratio (ACPR) better than 1.6% and 45 dB, respectively, while achieving an effective isotropic radiated power (EIRP) of 46.3 dBm.

Optimization of the Cold-Electron Bolometer and a Quasiparticle Cascade Amplifier in the Voltage-Biased Mode

An optimized concept of the Cold-Electron Bolometer (CEB) with Superconductor-Insulator-Normal (SIN) Tunnel Junction and Andreev SN contact for voltage-bias mode has been developed. The responsivity of this design is much better than the widespread concept of the CEB with two SIN tunnel junctions for the current-biased mode (SINIS structure) due to degradation of responsivity by a factor of two in voltage-bias (VB) mode. Besides that, for the realization of the CEB with the same capacitance, we need twice larger junctions that lead to four times larger area and volume of the absorber. As a result, the NEP of one SIN junction CEB is half that of two SIN junction CEB. A novel concept of the quasiparticle cascade amplifier (QCA) based on harvesting the waste energy of relaxed quasiparticles without any additional voltage bias has been developed. The distinguish feature of the cascade principle is utilizing the same dc voltage as used for CEB. The cascade principle of signal amplification proved to be possible due to the conversion of electrons to holes in the second absorber. The amplifier is based on the optimized CEB with one SIN junction and one SN contact. The coefficient of power amplification of the incoming signal to the potential energy of hot quasiparticles is huge and can achieve a level of 140 at the optimal bias point. The coefficient of power amplification of the QCA can reach a value of 30 and more to overcome the noise of the SQUID amplifier. For a power load of 6 pW, the total NEP of the CEB is decreased to the level of photon noise NEP, down to 0.7*NEP <sub xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">phot</sub> .

High-fidelity ATP imaging via an isothermal cascade catalytic amplifier.

Artificial catalytic DNA circuits that can identify, transduce and amplify the biomolecule of interest have supplemented a powerful toolkit for visualizing various biomolecules in cancer cells. However, the non-specific response in normal tissues and the low abundance of analytes hamper their extensive biosensing and biomedicine applications. Herein, by combining tumor-responsive MnO2 nanoparticles with a specific stimuli-activated cascade DNA amplifier, we propose a multiply guaranteed and amplified ATP-sensing platform via the successive cancer-selective probe exposure and stimulation procedures. Initially, the GSH-degradable MnO2 nanocarrier, acting as a tumor-activating module, ensures the accurate delivery of the cascade DNA amplifier into GSH-rich cancer cells and simultaneously provides adequate Mn2+ cofactors for facilitating the DNAzyme biocatalysis. Then, the released cascade amplifier, acting as an ATP-monitoring module, fulfills the precise and sensitive analysis of low-abundance ATP in cancer cells where the catalyzed hairpin assembly (CHA) is integrated with the DNAzyme biocatalyst for higher signal gain. Additionally, the cascade catalytic amplifier achieved tumor-specific activated photodynamic therapy (PDT) after integrating an activatable photosensitizer into the system. This homogeneous cascade catalytic aptasensing circuit can detect low-abundance endogenous ATP of cancer cells, due to its intrinsically rich recognition repertoire and avalanche-mimicking hierarchical acceleration, thus demonstrating broad prospects for analyzing clinically important biomolecules and the associated physiological processes.

A New Type of Right-leg-drive Circuit ECG Amplifier Using New Operational Amplifier

The low-power consumption and low-noise sensor remain an important challenge in Electrocardiogram (ECG) sensor field. A new operational amplifier (op-amp) design is proposed in this study, and it is integrated into the traditional “right-leg-drive” circuit to cancel out the common-mode interference. Besides, the gain of this circuit can be controlled by adjusting the value of these resistors. Then, the traditional op-amp is redesigned to improve the performance of this circuit. Some improvements are made on the basis of the traditional sleeve-type cascade amplifier to obtain good gain and gain bandwidth. At the same time, power consumption is not too high. Meanwhile, to minimize the noise of the op-amp without using large value capacitors, pseudo-resistors are used. The right-leg-drive circuit is used in the overall process to ensure good common-mode rejection ratio (CMRR) performance. For the newly designed op-amp, its gain can reach 60db, and the operating frequency of the circuit is between 0.1HZ and 108HZ, and the error is no more than 10%. The differential mode gain of the overall circuit is 43.4db, and the error is within 5db. The total power consumption of the circuit is 3.17u watts, which is less than the specified maximum power consumption, and the total integrated input-referred noise is 3.786μVRMS, which is less than the specified maximum circuit noise. The total capacitor usage is 1nF, less than the specified maximum capacitor usage. To sum up, the ECG sensor is designed using the “right leg drive circuit” and a new type of amplifier is designed to eliminate common-mode interference and improve the performance of the amplifier.

Characterizing cryogenic amplifiers with a matched temperature-variable noise source.

We present a cryogenic microwave noise source with a characteristic impedance of 50 Ω, which can be installed in a coaxial line of a cryostat. The bath temperature of the noise source is continuously variable between 0.1 K and 5 K without causing significant back-action heating on the sample space. As a proof-of-concept experiment, we perform Y-factor measurements of an amplifier cascade that includes a traveling wave parametric amplifier and a commercial high electron mobility transistor amplifier. We observe system noise temperatures as low as 680-200 +20 mK at 5.7 GHz corresponding to 1.5-0.7 +0.1 excess photons. The system we present has immediate applications in the validation of solid-state qubit readout lines.