Balanced Diode Mixer Research Articles

W-band Downconversion Mixer with Finline Transition for Intelligent Traffic System

A W-band MMIC mixer using 0.15-㎛ T-gate GaAs pHEMT technology is presented. The proposed mixer is designed as a single balanced diode mixer type with schottky barrier diode and implemented with finline transition for 77-㎓ intelligent traffic system(ITS) transceiver(TRx) module. The mixer also includes an IF amplifier to increase a conversion gain, and the waveguide-to-microstrip antipodal finline transition is designed with cosine-squared taper function curve and fabricated with duroid 5880 substrate. The optimized finline transition shows the measured insertion loss of less than 1㏈ and the return loss of higher than 20㏈ for 77㎓. The measured conversion gain of the proposed W-band mixer is 0.3㏈ at LO power of 11㏈m, which satisfies the mixer specification for ITS automotive collision avoidance radar receiver module.

Fundamental Limitations on the Output Power and the Third-Order Distortion of Balanced Mixers and Even Harmonic Mixers

A theoretical comparison of the fundamental limitations on the output power and the third-order distortion of balanced diode mixers and even harmonic mixers is described in this paper. In the authors’ previous work, formulas for the output power limitations of the mixers in a modulator operation were described. Using the described formulas, the output power and the third-order distortion of the mixers are calculated for a mixer operation and are represented as universal charts. Further, the closed-form formulas for the output power at a 1 dB gain compression and the intercept point of the third-order intermodulation products are presented. As mixers in a modulator operation, it is clarified that even harmonic mixers have a lower output power capability than balanced diode mixers. All the derived formulas were confirmed with experimental investigations at 100 MHz.

Phase locking of 2.324 and 2.959 terahertz quantum cascade lasers using a Schottky diode harmonic mixer.

The 23rd and 31st harmonics of a microwave signal generated in a novel THz balanced Schottky diode mixer were used as a frequency stable reference source to phase lock solid-nitrogen-cooled 2.324 and 2.959THz quantum cascade lasers. Hertz-level frequency stability was achieved, which was maintained for several hours.

Fundamental Limitations on the Output Power of Balanced Mixers and Even Harmonic Mixers in Modulator Operation

A theoretical comparison of fundamental limitations on the output power of balanced diode mixers and even harmonic mixers is presented in this paper. The modulator operation is employed for the formulation. Additionally, the maximum output power, the output power at the 1-dB gain compression point, and the conversion loss of both mixers are formulated. It is theoretically confirmed that even harmonic mixers exhibit output power saturation when there is a high local oscillator power, although balanced diode mixers exhibit no saturation. This saturation is caused by restrictions in the built-in voltage of diodes, and even harmonic mixers therefore have lower output power capability when compared to balanced diode mixers. Derived formulas are confirmed by performing experimental investigations at 100 MHz.

A Compact SIW Mixer For Millimeter-Wave Applications

The present paper highlights an innovative broadband millimeter-wave single balanced diode mixer which is designed using a newly designed 90 substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) coupler and two cavity (SIW) filters. The mixer covers RF/LO operating frequency range which fluctuates between 10 to 12 GHz and IF port covers 2GHz. The proposed mixer exhibits a fairly low conversion loss of less than 10 dB and high port to-port isolations over the frequency band of interest as the simulated results make clear. Furthermore, the two cavities SIW filter is embedded to achieve a better image frequency suppression of about 28dB. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.11591/ijece.v4i6.6684

Experimental Demonstration of Photonic Millimeter-Wave System for High Capacity Point-to-Point Wireless Communications

We present experimental results of 10 Gb/s wireless communications over a distance of 520 meters in the W-band. The transmitter makes use of photonic upconversion with a high bandwidth photodiode to allow for minimum hardware at the antenna. We present results with two receiver configurations. The first uses all electronic methods with a balanced Schottky diode mixer for downconversion, and the second uses photonics to limit the hardware at the receive antenna by photonically generating the local oscillator drive signal and transporting the intermediate frequency signal over a microwave photonic link.

Single Balanced Monolithic Diode Mixer using Marchand Balun for Millimeter-wave Applications

In this paper, we reported on a single balanced monolithic diode mixer using Marchand balun for millimeter-wave applications. The single balanced monolithic mixer was fabricated using drain-source-connected pseudomorphic high electron mobility transistor (PHEMT) diodes considering the PHEMT MMIC full process. The average conversion loss is 16 dB in the RF frequency range of 81~86 GHz at LO frequency of 75 GHz with LO power of 10 dBm. The RF-to-LO isolation characteristics are greater than -30 dB and the total chip size is .

Broadband Millimeter-Wave Single Balanced Mixer and Its Applications to Substrate Integrated Wireless Systems

This paper presents an innovative broadband millimeter-wave single balanced diode mixer that makes use of a substrate integrated waveguide (SIW)-based 180 hybrid. It has low conversion loss of less than 10 dB, excellent linearity, and high port-to-port isolations over a wide frequency range of 20 to 26 GHz. The proposed mixer has advantages over previously reported millimeter-wave mixer structures judging from a series of aspects such as cost, ease of fabrication, planar construction, and broadband performance. Furthermore, a receiver front-end that integrates a high-performance SIW slot-array antenna and our proposed mixer is introduced. Based on our proposed receiver front-end structure, a K-band wireless communication system with M-ary quadrature amplitude modulation is developed and demonstrated for line-of-sight channels. Excellent overall error vector magnitude performance has been obtained.

E-대역 상/하향 주파수 변환기용 소형 MMIC 단일 평형 다이오드 혼합기

본 논문에서는 0.1 <TEX>${\mu}M$</TEX> GaAs p-HEMT 상용 공정을 이용한 E-대역 상/하향 주파수 변환기용 소형 MMIC 단일 평형 다이오드 혼합기를 개발하였다. 본 혼합기에는 LO 발룬을 포함하며 우수한 RF 특성의 Marchand 발룬을 사용하였다. RF 포트와 IF 포트에서는 고역 통과 필터와 저역 통과 필터를 각각 사용하여 포트별 격리도를 향상시켰다. 0.58 <TEX>$mm^2$</TEX>(0.85 mm<TEX>${\times}$</TEX>0.68 mm) 칩 크기의 매우 소형으로 제작된 단일 평형 다이오드 혼합기의 측정 결과, 71～86 GHz 주파수 범위에서 10 dBm LO 입력에 대해 삽입 손실이 8～12 dB이고, 입력 P1dB가 1～5 dBm의 결과를 보였다. This paper presents a compact single balanced diode mixer fabricated using a 0.1 <TEX>${\mu}M$</TEX> GaAs p-HEMT commercial process for an E-band frequency up/down converter. This mixer includes a LO balun employing a Marchand balun with a good RF performance. In order to improve the port-to-port isolation, a high pass filter and a low pass filter are include in this mixer at the RF and IF ports, respectively. The fabricated mixer with a very compact size of 0.58 mm2(0.85 mm<TEX>${\times}$</TEX>0.68 mm) exhibits a conversion loss of 8～12 dB and an input P1dB of 1～5 dBm at the LO power of 10 dBm from 71～86 GHz.

BALANCED MIXERS USING WIDEBAND SYMMETRIC OFFSET STACK BALUN IN 0.18 UM CMOS

This work proposes a symmetrical ofiset stack coupled lines balun and a dual balun for a single balanced mixer and a star mixer, respectively. To achieve a minimum insertion loss and a maximum bandwidth, the design formulas are derived by properly selecting the width of coupled lines and the ofiset width between two coupled lines. The measured results of the proposed single and dual baluns achieve the bandwidths of over 110% and 90%, and insertion losses less than 4.4dB and 7.4dB at 38GHz. These two baluns occupy chip sizes of 0.07mm 2 . Two balanced diode mixers are further proposed and implemented in tsmc TM 0.18-m CMOS processes. These mixers utilize a stack balun feature wide bandwidth with very compact size. The measured results of the single balanced and star mixer achieve over 115% and 100% bandwidth for a conversion loss of < 15dB. The isolations are better than 24dB from 10 to 65GHz of the single balance mixer and better than 31dB from 20 to 65GHz of the star mixer.

Reduction of intermodulation distortions in the input radio receiving circuit

A technique for the compensation of the third order intermodulation components in the “low-noise amplifier-double balanced diode mixer” circuit has been considered. This technique is based on the optimization of theLNAtransfer ratio and the power of mixer heterodyne. The proposed technique makes it possible to obtain the gain in terms of intermodulation of about 26–31 dB.

A millimeter-wave monolithic doubly balanced diode mixer

A broadband miniature doubly balanced diode mixer chip fabricated by Win's 0.15 μm pHEMT technology is presented. In order to save chip area, a four-fold modified Marchand balun is used. A coupled line U section improves the port to port isolation and provides the IF-output port. The mixer achieves a low conversion loss of 5.5 to 10.7 dB and high isolation of more than 26 dB over a 26–40 GHz RF/LO bandwidth and a DC-14 GHz IF bandwidth. The mixer's chip size is around 0.96 mm2.

A New Ka-Band Doubly BalancedMixer Based on Lange Couplers

A compact Ka-band doubly balanced diode mixer with new phase relationships is demonstrated. In this design, a novel configuration was employed to have good performance while keeping compact size and simple intermediate frequency (IF) extraction. It is flexible not only in layout design, but also in the reduction of IF inductance. The chip dimension is as small as 0.851.35 mm, implemented by using a 0.15 m PHEMT technology. This mixer has a conversion loss between 9 to 12 dB, a dc-3.5 GHz IF bandwidth, and a good port-to-port isolation in Ka band.

마이크로파 주파수 하향 변환기에서의 대역 평탄도 개선을 위한 여파기 집적형 단일 평형 다이오드 혼합기 설계

본 논문에서는 유럽형 점 대 점 마이크로파 고정 통신에 이용되는 주파수 하향 변환기 설계에 있어, 평탄도 개선 측면에서 접근한 단일 평형 주파수 혼합기의 설계 및 제작 결과에 대해 소개하도록 한다. 일반적인 주파수 하향 변환기의 구성에서 주파수 혼합기에 연결되는 RF필터 등의 여파기 임피던스 특성이 RF 대역에서만 유지되고 LO 대역에서는 그 특성이 달라져 LO 구동 전력이 혼합기 다이오드에 불규칙하게 인가됨에 따라 대역 평탄도 특성이 악화된다. 이에 대해 본 논문에서는 영상 대역 제거 필터 및 LO 고조파 필터를 혼합기 내에 집적하고 여파기와 혼합기 포트 간 전기적 길이를 이용하여, 평탄도 특성에 대한 여파기의 영향을 최소로 한 여파기 집적형 주파수 혼합기를 설계하였다. 제작된 주파수 혼합기는 RF 대역 <TEX>$21.2{\sim}22.6\;GHz$</TEX>, LO 대역 <TEX>$19.32{\sim}20.72\;GHz$</TEX> IF 대역 1.88 GHz+/-50 MHz의 주파수 재원을 가지며, LO 구동 전력 10 dBm에서 영상 대역 제거 필터를 포함한 변환 손실이 8.5 dB, 대역평탄도 2 dB, 입력 PldB 8 dBm, 입력 IIP3 15 dBm의 특성을 보였다. RF, LO 및 IF 포트의 반사 손실은 각각 -12 dB, -10 dB, -5 dB의 특성을 보였다. LO/RF, LO/IF 격리도는 각각 20 dB, 50 dB로 측정되었다. In this.paper, we introduce design and implementation results of the single balanced diode mixer for European point-to-point microwave radio in order to improve flatness performance. When a resonator such as RF filter is integrated with a mixer, impedance characteristic of 50 ohm is maintained only in RF band, not in LO band resulting deterioration of flatness performance because of LO power variation on the diode. In the paper, we suggest a design method of mixer integrated with image rejection filter and LO harmonic filter to have a better performance of flatness using embedding electrical length between filter and mixer's port. Frequency specification of fabricated mixer is <TEX>$21.2{\sim}22.6\;GHz$</TEX> for RF, <TEX>$19.32{\sim}20.72\;GHz$</TEX> for LO and 1.88 GHz+/-50 MHz for IF, respectively. Measured results show conversion loss of 8.5 dB, flatness of 2 dB, input PldB of 8 dBm, IIP3 of 15 dBm under LO power level of 10 dBm. Return losses of RF, LO and IF port are under -12 dB, -10 dB and -5 dB, respectively. Isolations of LO/RF and LO/IF are 20 dB and 50 dB, respectively.

A highly linear double balanced Schottky diode S-band mixer

A high-level double balanced SiC Schottky diode mixer in SiC monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) technology has been designed, processed and characterized. The mixer is a single ended in- and output circuit with coupled transformers as baluns to enable a compact design, resulting in a total area of 2.2/spl times/2.2mm/sup 2/. The mixer has a maximum IIP/sub 3/ of 38dBm and IIP/sub 2/ of 58dBm at 3.3GHz, and a typical P/sub 1 dB/ of 23dBm in the S-band. The minimum conversion loss was 12dBm at 2.4GHz. The high power operation of the mixer shows that SiC MMIC can perform well in high microwave radiation environments.

Compact and broad-band millimeter-wave monolithic transformer balanced mixers

Three broad-band miniature monolithic transformer singly balanced diode mixers for operation in the microwave and millimeter-wave bands are reported in this paper. The coupled-line equivalent models are used to synthesize the initial design of these transformers up to 50 GHz. The first one is a broad-band spiral transformer mixer, and the second one is a 21-GHz Marchand-type transformer mixer. These two mixers with chip sizes around 0.29 mm/sup 2/ exhibit bandwidths of 105% and 54.5%, respectively. We also propose a 30-GHz single-coiled transformer mixer, which has comparable performance with the first two mixers and reduced chip size. The single-coiled transformer mixer achieves a bandwidth of 100% with the chip size smaller than 0.25mm/sup 2/. In order to save chip area, all these transformers provide broad-band matching to the diodes directly. To the authors' knowledge, these mixers achieve the widest bandwidths with the smallest chip sizes among all passive balanced mixers using monolithic-microwave integrated-circuit processes in dc-40-GHz frequency range.

A new single balanced diode mixer with DGS cell lowpass filter

AbstractIn this paper, a single balanced diode mixer using harmonic‐suppressed defected ground structure (DGS) low‐pass filter (LPF) with dumbbell shape is presented. The frequency bandwidth selected is C‐band, with 5.72–5.82 GHz for RF, 5.58–5.68 GHz for LO, and 140 MHz for IF signals. A rat‐race hybrid is designed for the accomplishment of the single balanced type of mixer. A low‐pass filter using DGS is used for good conversion loss and unwanted 2nd and 3rd harmonic suppression. The mixer is compared to a reference mixer with conventional low‐pass filter. When an LO signal with power of 4 dBm at 5.635 GHz is injected, a conversion loss of 6.2 dB is observed for the mixer. Also, LO‐to‐RF and LO‐to‐IF isolations of 30 dB and 40 dB are obtained, respectively. This mixer can be used in the area for wireless LAN application. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Microwave Opt Technol Lett 43: 423–425, 2004; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI 10.1002/mop.20489

4H-silicon carbide schottky barrier diodes for microwave applications

In this paper, physical models for vertical 4H-silicon carbide (4H-SiC) Schottky diodes are used to develop a design method, where a maximum cutoff frequency for a given punch-through is achieved. The models presented are also used to extract microwave simulator computer-aided design (CAD) models for the devices. A device process was developed and Schottky diodes were fabricated in-house. Characterization of the devices was performed and compared to the theoretical models with good agreement. A demonstrator singly balanced diode mixer was simulated using the developed models. The mixer was fabricated using the in-house developed diodes, and measurements on the mixer show good agreement with the CAD simulations. A conversion loss of 5.2 dB was achieved at 850 MHz, and an excellent IIP/sub 3/ of 31 dBm at 850-MHz RF was measured, at 30-dBm P/sub LO/. These results verify the enhanced properties of the SiC Schottky diode compared to other nonwide bandgap diodes.

Design and performance of a new uniplanar diode mixer

We report the development of a new uniplanar singly balanced diode mixer. The new mixer employs a novel 180/spl deg/ out-of-phase power divider using slotline and coplanar waveguide. Good results were obtained for the first-designed mixer. The conversion loss is between 6.5-10 dB for the radio-frequency (RF) signal from 10 to 11.6 GHz and the LO signal of 6 dBm at 7 GHz. The LO-to-RF, RF-to-IF, and LO-to-IF isolations are more than 16, 20, and 38 dB, respectively. These results signify the feasibility of the new mixer and hence demonstrate an attractive device for microwave and millimeter-wave integrated circuits.

2.4 GHz single-balanced diode mixer fabricated on Al2O3 substrate by thin-film technology

A passive balun using spiral inductors and interdigital capacitors has been developed for a 2.4 GHz balanced diode mixer on Al2O3 substrates. Using this passive balun on the input port (RF port and LO port) of a mixer circuit and incorporating the Schottky diode model, a wideband single-balanced diode mixer was designed, fabricated, and characterized © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Microwave Opt Technol Lett 25: 83–86, 2000.