RF Front-end Research Articles

An FPGA Scalable Software-Defined Radio Platform for UAS Communications Research

In the framework of modern Unmanned Aerial System (UAS) ground-board communications, a data-link system should provide with the following features [1]: multiband and adaptive modulations for responding to channel conditions changes and multi-standard interoperability, interferences resilience with a secure physical layer, incorporation of an air-to-air link complementary to the classical air-to-ground links. Varying the available communication functions to provide the above features without the need to substitute on-board components is a desired target. For this purpose, a Field Programmable Gate Aray (FPGA) scalable Software Defined Radio hardware Platform (SDRP) and its control and baseband signal processing architecture have been developed. The platform is composed by means of three boards which provide respectively the power supply, an FPGA based processing core and the radio frequency front-end. The control and baseband signal processing architecture, implemented on the FPGA, is designed with an application-independent section, working as a base reference design, and a reconfigurable section that implements communication functions and algorithms. The overall platform, at the board and FPGA architecture level, has been designed considering scalability and modularity as key features. Thanks to this platform a data-link which responds to the above target can be easily implemented. As a case study a reconfigurable data-link between a UAS and a Ground Control Station (GCS), designed to establish reliable communication in all the phases of a flight (parking, taxiing, taking off, cruising and landing), is presented.

Design of a Wideband CMOS Balun and Its Application in a Wideband RF Front-End

This paper presents a 1:2 wideband CMOS balun, and its application for sub-6 GHz wideband front-end. In order to eliminate the amplitude/phase mismatch, the primary and secondary windings are shorted by a transmission line (T-line) for a common ground. The float metal in the primary winding is used for artificial dielectric compensation which further reduce the amplitude imbalance by up to about 0.5 dB. A 2.0-to-3.7 GHz wideband RF front-end is also designed by using the proposed CMOS balun. The balun and RF front-end are fabricated in a 0.13- μm bulk CMOS technology. The bandwidth of the balun with |S11| <; -10 dB is 2.2-to-5.1 GHz. The fractional bandwidth is large than 79.5%. The corresponding maximum amplitude and phase mismatch is 1.5 dB and 2°, respectively. The measured insertion loss is 4.8-to-5.6 dB from 2.2 to 5.1 GHz.

2.4 GHz BLE Receiver With Power-Efficient Quadrature RF-to-Baseband-Current-Reuse Architecture for Low-Power IoT Applications

In this paper, a 2.4 GHz Bluetooth low energy receiver employing a power-efficient quadrature RF-to-baseband-current-reuse architecture is presented for low-power low-voltage internet of things applications. The proposed quadrature RF-to-baseband-current-reuse RF front-end consists of a low-noise transconductance amplifier, an active-type polyphase filter-based quadrature generator, transimpedance amplifiers, and double-balanced current-mode passive mixers on a single dc current path. An input matching network is used to perform power-constrained simultaneous noise and input power matching and 1/ <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$f$ </tex-math></inline-formula> noise reduction in the RF and baseband domains, respectively. The quadrature RF signals are provided to the single-quadrature mixers through an embedded active-type polyphase filter-based quadrature generator. The implemented Bluetooth low energy receiver is composed of the RF-to-baseband-current-reuse RF front-end, IF amplifiers, two-stage passive- <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">RC</i> polyphase filter, and fifth-order Chebyshev-II <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$G_{m}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">-C</i> filters. The proposed design was fabricated using a 65-nm CMOS process and characterized primarily in the Bluetooth low energy operating frequency bands. The active die area of the implemented receiver was 0.85 mm <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> , and the receiver drew a bias current of 1.41 mA from a nominal supply voltage of 0.8 V. The Bluetooth low energy receiver achieved a noise figure of 13.2 dB, conversion gain of 42 dB, image rejection ratio of more than 30 dB, and input-referred third-order intercept point of −25 dBm.

Cognitive AmBC-NOMA IoV-MTS Networks With IQI: Reliability and Security Analysis

Internet-of-Vehicle (IoV) enabled Maritime Transportation Systems (MTS) communication is anticipated to support ultra-reliable and low latency, diverse quality-of-service (QoS) and large-scale connectivities. To meet such stringent demands, a cognitive ambient backscatter non-orthogonal multiple access (C-AmBC-NOMA) IoV-MTS network is proposed. We explore the reliable and secure performance of the proposed C-AmBC-NOMA IoV-MTS network with in-phase and quadrature phase imbalance (IQI) at radio-frequency (RF) front-ends and the existence of an eavesdropper. In particular, the analytical expressions on the outage probability (OP) and intercept probability (IP) are obtained after a series of calculations. For a deeper understanding, we discuss the asymptotic behavior of OPs in the high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) region, the diversity orders of OPs, and IPs in the high main-to-eavesdropper ratio (MER) regime. The results of Monte-Carlo simulation and a series of corresponding theoretical analysis show that: i) As the SNR approaches infinity, the OPs tend to be fixed non-negative values, indicating that the diversity orders of the OPs have error floors; ii) When the MER approaches infinity, the IPs of legitimate users decrease continuously, while the IP of backscatter device (BD) increases; iii) Compared with the system performance under ideal condition, the system performance is less reliable under IQI condition, but the security performance is enhanced; iv) By carefully selecting the system parameters, a trade-off can be achieved between reliability and security.

Adaptive Multi-Input Medium Access Control (AMI-MAC) Design Using Physical Layer Cognition for Tactical SDR Networks

Tactical software defined radio (SDR) networks demand stringent requirements of latency, throughput, and reliability. In the past, significant efforts have been made to achieve maximal efficiency with modifications and improvements either in an individual layer or through the cross-layer design of its working protocol. In this paper, we propose a novel cross-layer design consisting of adaptive multi-input medium access control (AMI-MAC) layer along with an intelligent channel allocation scheme supported by a multiband multimode physical layer. A cognitive engine further empowers this cross-layer design approach to achieve high throughput, improved quality of service (QoS), and adaptive range capabilities. The proposed physical layer exhibits a mixed use of narrowband and wideband waveforms accommodating different range requirements as per demanded QoS. The uniqueness of the proposed physical layer enables SDR to operate in hybrid topology by receiving multiple narrowband signals of different bandwidths with the same configuration of wideband RF front end. The proposed AMI-MAC design ensures a reduction in both control and data phase latency. MAC layer ensures the maximal utilization of the time and frequency spectrum. Bandwidth and delay optimization is also managed by the proposed trio of the physical layer, MAC, and cognition to reduce latency and achieve desired QoS. Simulation results are presented to show the superiority of the proposed design over conventional tactical radio MAC.

Full-Duplex DF Relaying With Parallel Hybrid FSO/RF Transmissions

The ever-increasing demands for higher data rates in telecommunications networks, along with the significant benefits offered by wireless communications, have pushed the technological developments to new frontiers. Free-space optical (FSO) communications are among the technologies that can address these emerging demands, offering large and unregulated bandwidth. In addition, recent advances in radio frequency (RF) systems have enabled the development of in-band full-duplex (FD) radios with the employment of advanced self-interference cancellation techniques. Therefore, in this paper we study a robust FD relaying system comprised of parallel hybrid FSO/RF communication links, where the coordination of transmissions between the FSO/RF subsystems is carried out by the hard-switching protocol. The operation of the RF links is impaired by Nakagami-m fading, the residual self-interference due to the FD relaying operation, and the in-phase and quadrature-phase imbalance effect due to imperfect RF front-ends. As far as the FSO links are concerned, we consider the influence of the joint effects of atmospheric turbulence, beam wander and pointing errors. We first derive analytical closed-form expressions for the outage probability of both subsystems as well as for the overall FD relaying hybrid system. Then, asymptotic expressions are extracted for the outage performance in the high signal-to-noise ratio regime. The achievable outage diversity orders of both FSO and RF subsystems are determined, which provide significant insight into the design of such hybrid systems in a wide variety of operating conditions. Finally, the numerical results are presented using the derived outcomes, and significant conclusions are drawn about FD relaying hybrid systems.

Cross-Mixing Hybrid Beamformer for Wideband Apertures

Existing beamforming arrays suffer from the size and cost of the RF front-end and digital back-end components. In this paper, a novel hybrid beamforming configuration for wideband receivers is introduced. The design replaces phase shifters and local oscillators (LO) with cross mixing antenna elements to maximize diversity gain. In this paper, an analytical model of the cross mixing beamformer (CMB) is first presented. Simulations are carried out showing that a maximum diversity gain can be achieved with the CMB approach. Two prototypes were implemented using $2\times 1$ and $4\times 2$ element arrays and tested at 2.31 GHz. Measured results show that CMB achieves coherent signal combining and can preserve the phase delay information needed for hybrid beamforming setups.

Wideband Dipole Array With Balanced Wideband Impedance Transformer (BWIT)

Within the context of modern digital phased array (DPA) radios, differential Radio Frequency (RF) front-ends provide much greater immunity to noise and distortion by suppressing second order harmonics. Recent advancements in differential RF front-ends offer high dynamic range, high linearity, and low noise in the transceiver chain. However, a major roadblock to fully differential systems is the presence of common-mode resonances. In this article, we present a novel wideband differential feed for dipole arrays that overcomes this bottleneck. Our dipole array is developed for the L-S band (viz. 1.05 GHz to 3.2 GHz) with emphasis on dual-linear polarization and resonance-free scanning to low angles. The novelty of this article is the Balanced Wideband Impedance Transformer (BWIT) feed that mitigates common-mode currents across the entire band while scanning to low angles. Array simulations are verified with measurements of an $8\times 8$ prototype in a volume of 384mmx384mmx57 mm. The array achieves resonance-free scanning across a 3:1 impedance bandwidth with VSWR <; 3 for the cases of $\theta = 0^{\circ }$ (Broadside), 45° (D-plane), 60° (E-plane) and across a 2.37:1 impedance bandwidth with VSWR <; 3 for the case of 45° (H-plane). Measured gain achieves near-theoretical values across the operating band.

A Multimode 5–6 GHz FD/HD/FDD Quadrature Balanced CMOS Front End With Transmit–Receive Cross-Modulation Distortion Correction

We introduce a multimode and wideband quadrature balanced CMOS RF front end (RFFE) supporting full-duplex (FD), half-duplex (HD), and frequency-division duplex (FDD) operation at the 5-6 GHz band. The proposed RFFE is enhanced by nonlinear digital algorithms that maintain optimal performance at high transmit (Tx) power levels. A theoretical model of the transmit-receive (TR) cross-modulation (CM) distortion mechanism stemming from instantaneous variations in the power amplifiers (PAs) output impedance is laid out and verified in simulation and measurement. A 2-D digital postdistortion (2-D DPoD) algorithm that utilizes the known baseband Tx signal and the downconverted distorted Rx signal is proposed to linearize the CM-distorted Rx signal, in conjunction with wideband digital RF and baseband cancellation of the Tx self-interference at the receiver input and 1-D digital predistortion to linearize the Tx signal. The system was characterized in simultaneous TR operation using 802.11ac VHT Wi-Fi signals at 10 dBm average Tx power. In the FD mode using 20 MHz signals, TR isolation of 66 dB was achieved, and the 2-D DPoD corrected Rx error vector magnitude (EVM) by 11 dB to a value of -33 dB. In the FDD mode with 800 MHz frequency separation, 14 dB improvement was demonstrated in Rx EVM with 2-D DPoD to the levels of -35 and -31 dB for 20 and 160 MHz signals, respectively. Similar EVM values were measured in the HD Rx mode at -40 dBm average Rx power, along with Rx insertion loss lower than 1 dB without using a TR switch.

A Four-Element 500-MHz 40-mW 6-bit ADC-Enabled Time-Domain Spatial Signal Processor

Next-generation wireless communication requires phased-array systems with large modulated bandwidths and high energy efficiency, ensuring Gb/s data communication. Conventional phase-shifter-based arrays result in frequency-dependent processing and, therefore, beam-squinting in an array. This work demonstrates a four-element 500-MHz modulated bandwidth true-time-delay-based ADC-enabled spatial signal processor (SSP) with frequency-uniform beamforming, wideband beam-nulling, and multiple independent interference filterings using the Kronecker decomposition. This processor can augment conventional phased-array RF front ends to implement a complete antenna-to-digital solution. The proposed baseband delay-compensating solution in the SSP uses scalable time-domain circuits comprising of time-interleaved voltage-to-time converters followed by asynchronous 6-bit pipeline time-to-digital converters and consumes only 40 mW with a total area of 0.31 mm <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> in 65-nm CMOS technology.

Broadband and Fast Carrier Cancellation for Backscattered RFID Communications

Ultrahigh frequency radio frequency identification (UHF RFID) uses backscattered electromagnetic (EM) modulation techniques to communicate between readers and tags. The suppression of the carrier signal leaked from the transmission channel to the receiving channel is the key factor that determines the reader’s sensitivity. In this letter, a broadband, fast carrier cancellation technique is proposed. The reader system uses two transmission ports: one is for the transmission of the interrogating signal and carrier waves (CWs) and the other port can dynamically sample the leakage signal in the receiving channel and generate a cancellation signal with the same amplitude but opposite phase of the leakage. This technique is implemented using an AD9361 transceiver chip as RF front end and a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) board as the protocol and cancellation controller. Experiments demonstrate that a suppression of around 92 to 106 dB can be achieved within 0.5 ms in a UHF RFID system. The cancellation technique is also broadband; with a matched antenna, the experiment shows that cancellation can work effectively from 0.3 to 6 GHz.

Energy Efficiency Analysis of MIMO Wideband RF Front-End Receivers.

Energy-efficiency is crucial for modern radio-frequency (RF) receivers dedicated to Internet of Things applications. Energy-efficiency enhancements could be achieved by lowering the power consumption of integrated circuits, using antenna diversity or even with an association of both strategies. This paper compares two wideband RF front-end architectures, based on conventional low-noise amplifiers (LNA) and low-noise transconductance amplifiers (LNTA) with N-path filters, operating with three transmission schemes: single antenna, antenna selection and singular value decomposition beamforming. Our results show that the energy-efficiency behavior varies depending on the required communication link conditions, distance between nodes and metrics from the front-end receivers. For short-range scenarios, LNA presents the best performance in terms of energy-efficiency mainly due to its very low power consumption. With the increasing of the communication distance, the very low noise figure provided by N-path LNTA-based architectures outperforms the power consumption issue, yielding higher energy-efficiency for all transmission schemes. In addition, the selected front-end architecture depends on the number of active antennas at the receiver. Hence, we can observe that low noise figure is more important with a few active antennas at the receiver, while low power consumption becomes more important when the number of active RF chains at the receiver increases.

Power-Efficient CMOS Cellular RF Receivers for Carrier Aggregation According to RF Front-End Configuration

This article presents power-efficient radio frequency (RF) receiver designs, particularly for advanced long-term evolution cellular applications. The two proposed single-ended receiver architectures can fully support multiple-channel RF signals in advanced carrier aggregation (CA) scenarios with maximum design flexibility depending on the RF front-end module configuration and target applications. Two different low-noise amplifier (LNA) topologies are employed in receivers to achieve different bandwidth handling capabilities and linearity requirements. The first receiver architecture utilizes narrowband LNAs with a current-reusing technique using a 28-nm low-power complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) technology. The proposed receiver with this single-ended narrowband LNA can handle up to three carrier components (CCs) CA. The second receiver architecture shows wideband characteristics and employs current-efficient and high linear wideband LNAs. This proposed design can support up to five CC CA and is implemented in a 14-nm Fin field-effect-transistor CMOS technology. Moreover, frequency-band switchable transformers are utilized in both designs to realize size-efficient receivers. Both proposed receivers operate at a frequency ranging from 0.6 to 2.7 GHz. The implemented narrowband and wideband receivers have conversion gains exceeding 70 and 62 dB, and achieve noise figures of less than 3.5 and 5 dB during all CA scenarios, respectively. The proposed receivers operate at a nominal supply of 1.2 and 1.0 V for 28 and 14-nm CMOS technologies, respectively.

Analysis and Design of a Broadband Output Stage With Current-Reuse and a Low Insertion-Loss Bypass Mode for CMOS RF Front-End LNAs

This article presents a comprehensive analysis of a novel broadband output stage for external RF front-end low-noise amplifiers (eLNAs). Both variants of the output stage are manufactured using a 130nm bulk CMOS technology. They utilize a common-drain output stage with current-reuse topology, switchable resistive feedback, and source-degeneration. Also, a novel inductor-less low insertion-loss bypass mode is implemented for enhanced bypass functionality. The LNAs are implemented with 4 gain modes achieving excellent RF performance in all possible mobile communication scenarios. Furthermore, an auxiliary linearization circuitry (NMOS IMD sinker) is implemented for variant β to improve linearity performance in low gain mode. Besides, the LNAs support all frequency bands between 1.4GHz and 2.7GHz by only changing the external matching component, allowing easy adaption to different frequency bands. Two offered solutions are realized with a die size of only 0.16mm <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> and 0.11mm <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> , respectively. The power consumption is 6.0mW in high gain, 3.6mW in low gain and active-bypass and 0.12mW in bypass mode using a supply voltage of 1.2V. Moreover, a 5.15GHz LNA with high-Q on-chip matching and the broadband output stage is realized and manufactured using a 60nm RF SOI technology. A NF performance of only 1.15dB is achieved consuming only 6.0mW power.

Binary-Sequence Frequency Hopping Communication Method Based on Pseudo-Random Linear Frequency Modulation

To improve the signal detection performance of binary-sequence frequency hopping communication when the complementary channel is jammed, a binary-sequence frequency hopping communication system based on pseudo-random liner frequency modulation (LFM) is proposed. The transmitting end uses the chirp signal to carry out the in-band spread spectrum of the binary-sequence frequency hopping signal, and then sends it out through the radio frequency front end. At the receiving end, the received signal is dehopped and processed by fractional Fourier transform. The source information is obtained by sampling decision. Firstly, a binary-sequence frequency hopping system model based on pseudo-random LFM is constructed. Secondly, the bit error rate expression of anti-partial band jamming and follower jamming under the Rice channel is derived. The results show that this method has at least 5 dB performance gain than binary sequence frequency hopping for different parameter settings under partial band jamming and follower jamming, and the anti-jamming performance is significantly better than the conventional frequency hopping communication.

Reliable, Compact, and Tunable MEMS Bandpass Filter Using Arrays of Series and Shunt Bridges for 28-GHz 5G Applications

This work presents radio frequency (RF) microelectromechanical system (MEMS)-based compact, high power, and reliable tunable bandpass filter for millimeter-wave RF front end. The design is fabricated on 635- $\mu \text{m}$ alumina substrate using surface micromachining process. All functional building blocks of the filter are fabricated and tested independently to ensure the optimum filter performances. Total area of the filter is only 2.3 mm2 including bias lines and pads. The proposed filter can be tuned to any frequency between 27 and 29 GHz and it demonstrates insertion loss of 1.92 dB and matching of 23.4 dB at 28 GHz with fractional bandwidth (FBW) of 6.7%. Filter also gives bandwidth tuning of 4.4 GHz with acceptable loss. Filter works satisfactorily up to 1 billion cycles with 1 W of power. Device reliability tested within a low-cost package. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first reported tunable MEMS bandpass filter in the literature which has undergone and presented with extensive reliability results.

Wideband Multimode Leaky-Wave Feed for Scanning Lens-Phased Array at Submillimeter Wavelengths

In this article, we propose a hybrid electromechanical scanning lens antenna array architecture suitable for the steering of highly directive beams at submillimeter wavelengths with field-of-views (FoV) of ±25°. The concept relies on combining electronic phase shifting of a sparse array with a mechanical translation of a lens array. The use of a sparse-phased array significantly simplifies the RF front-end (number of active components, routing, thermal problems), while the translation of a lens array steers the element patterns to angles off-broadside, reducing the impact of grating lobes over a wide FoV. The mechanical translation required for the lens array is also significantly reduced compared to a single large lens, leading to faster and low-power mechanical implementation. In order to achieve wide bandwidth and large steering angles, a novel leaky wave lens feed concept is also implemented. A 550-GHz prototype was fabricated and measured demonstrating the scanning capabilities of the embedded element pattern and the radiation performance of the leaky wave fed antenna.

(Plenary) The Revival of Compound Semiconductors and How They Will Change the World in a 5G/6G Era

Compound semiconductor devices have always intrigued the semiconductor industry due to their high intrinsic mobilities and the heterostructure engineering enabled by those materials. While CMOS has been the vehicle pushing the industry to ever smaller devices, better performance and of course reduced cost, the unique properties of compound semiconductor devices are finding renewed interest in an era where an increasing amount of data is being sent around, stored and analyzed. While several applications like photonics, high-power electronics and image sensors also benefit from enabling a variety of III-V materials and devices, specifically, in the RF Front-End Modules of 5G radio chips [1], these materials allow to address the challenges related to speed, efficiency and output power needed for this next generation wireless communication standard. And while 5G is in full deployment, with first addressing the sub-6GHz frequency bands and in a later phase the mm-wave frequency bands, first publications are already appearing on 6G, where even higher frequencies (beyond > 100GHz) will be targeted [2].GaN [3] and InP-based devices [4] have a clear performance advantage over Si CMOS and SiGe HBT/BICMOS, but their lower integration potential, still restricted to smaller size substrates and lab-like processing today, is one of the key limitations for adopting those technologies for high-volume 5G and 6G applications. Upscaling those devices to a 200mm/300mm Si platform will be a first step to improve yield and maturity and increase complexity. In a second phase, upscaling and maturing these technologies will allow to co-integrate these devices, usually quite dissimilar to CMOS, with advanced Si technology nodes and provide a fully integrated heterogeneous system.In this talk, we will review the status and progress toward integrating these devices on a CMOS-compatible platform.

HDDM Hardware Evaluation for Robust Interference Mitigation.

Interference can significantly degrade the performance of global navigation satellite system (GNSS) receivers. Therefore, mitigation methods are required to ensure reliable operations. However, as there are different types of interference, robust, multi-purpose mitigation algorithms are needed. This paper describes the most popular state-of-the-art interference mitigation techniques. The high-rate DFT-based data manipulator (HDDM) is proposed as a possible solution to overcome their limitations. This paper presents a hardware implementation of the HDDM algorithm. The hardware HDDM module is integrated in three different receivers equipped with analog radio-frequency (RF) front-ends supporting signals with different dynamic range. The resource utilization and power consumption is evaluated for the three cases. The algorithm is compared to a low-end mass-market receiver and a high-end professional receiver with basic and sophisticated interference mitigation capabilities, respectively. Different type of interference are used to compare the mitigation capabilities of the receivers under test. Results of the HDDM hardware implementation achieve the similar or improved performance to the state of the art. With more complex interferences, like frequency hopping or pulsed, the HDDM shows even better performance.

Compact N-Band Tree-Shaped Multiplexer-Based Antenna Structures for 5G/IoT Mobile Devices.

This paper presents a simple, compact and low-cost design method that allows one to obtain low-profile multi-band antennas for the overcrowded future generation networks, which are widely versatile and very heterogeneous in the K/Ka bands. The proposed antennas comprise n radiating monopoles, one for each of the desired operating frequencies, along with a frequency selective feeding network fed at a single point. This concept enables a single antenna to be shared with different radio-frequency (RF) frontends, potentially saving space. Typically, with n-band structures the biggest challenge is to make them highly efficient and here this is assured by multiplexing the frequency, and thus isolating each of the monopoles, allowing the design of scalable structures which fit the 5G applications. Based on the vision proposed here, a dual-band and a tri-band structures were built and characterized by their main parameters. Both prototypes achieved peak efficiencies around 80%, with adequate bandwidths and gains, as well as great compactness.