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Wireless Transceiver Design for RF/MM Waves and THz Communication

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A special issue of Micromachines (ISSN 2072-666X). This special issue belongs to the section "E：Engineering and Technology".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (25 September 2023) | Viewed by 8692

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Dr. Mihai Sanduleanu

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Guest Editor

Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Khalifa University, Abu Dhabi 127788, United Arab Emirates
Interests: mm and sub mm Waves; RF; Analog Mixed-Signal

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Wireless transceiver design for RF/mm waves and THz communication has increasingly been a subject for research and industrial focus over the past few years. Traditional architectures for transceiver design are conducive to high power consumption. Therefore, we are interested in novel architectures that will ensure lower power consumption and smaller footprints. Furthermore, we are interested in new applications for THz regimes. One example is the use of lithography-based technologies to establish nanostructures that are subsequently transferred to 3D imaging at sub-mm waves. Free bands, the need to communicate faster, and nanoscale and modern sub-micron technologies are the key enablers for these applications. Accordingly, this Special Issue seeks to showcase research papers, communications, and review articles that focus on novel methodological developments in wireless transceiver design, i.e., novel architectures and applications.

We look forward to receiving your submissions.

Dr. Mihai Sanduleanu
Guest Editor

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Keywords

THz
wireless communications
transceiver design
imaging
mm and sub-mm waves

Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

9 pages, 4270 KiB

Open AccessArticle

160 GHz D-Band Low-Noise Amplifier and Power Amplifier for Radar-Based Contactless Vital-Signs-Monitoring Systems

by Ademola Akeem Mustapha and Mihai Sanduleanu

Micromachines 2023, 14(5), 993; https://doi.org/10.3390/mi14050993 - 02 May 2023

Viewed by 1674

Abstract

This paper presents a 160 GHz, D-band, low-noise amplifier (LNA) and a D-band power amplifier (PA) implemented in the Global Foundries 22 nm CMOS FDSOI. The two designs are used for the contactless monitoring of vital signs in the D-band. The LNA is based on multiple stages of a cascode amplifier topology with a common source topology adopted as the input and output stages. The input stage of the LNA is designed for simultaneous input and output matching, while the inter-stage-matching networks are designed for maximizing the voltage swing. The LNA achieved a maximum gain of 17 dB at 163 GHz. The input return loss was quite poor in the 157–166 GHz frequency band. The −3 dB gain bandwidth corresponded to 157–166 GHz. The measured noise figure was between 7.6 dB and 8 dB within the −3 dB gain bandwidth. The power amplifier achieved an output 1 dB compression point of 6.8 dBm at 159.75 GHz. The measured power consumptions of the LNA and the PA were 28.8 mW and 10.8 mW, respectively. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Wireless Transceiver Design for RF/MM Waves and THz Communication)

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18 pages, 12001 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Near-Field Beam Training in Terahertz Communications with Hybrid Beamforming Architecture

by Yuxin Xie, Boyu Ning, Lingxiang Li and Zhi Chen

Micromachines 2023, 14(4), 880; https://doi.org/10.3390/mi14040880 - 19 Apr 2023

Viewed by 1250

Abstract

Terahertz (THz) communication has a large available bandwidth, which is expected to be deployed in future communication networks. As THz wave suffers from severe propagation loss in wireless transmission, we consider a THz near-field scenario where a base station (BS) is equipped with a large-scale antenna array with a low-cost hybrid beamforming architecture to serve mobile users nearby. However, the large-scale array and the user mobility incur difficulty in channel estimation. To tackle this issue, we propose a near-field beam training scheme that can align a beam to the user in a fast way by searching the codebook. Specifically, the BS employs a uniform circular array (UCA), and the radiation pattern of the beams in our proposed codebook appears as ellipsoids. To cover the serving zone with the minimum codebook size, we develop a near-field codebook by tangent arrangement approach (TAA). To reduce the time overhead, we leverage the hybrid beamforming architecture to realize multi-beam training concurrently since each RF chain can enable a codeword whose element has a constant magnitude. Numerical results validate that our proposed UCA near-field codebook achieves less time cost while achieving a comparable coverage performance compared to the conventional near-field codebook. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Wireless Transceiver Design for RF/MM Waves and THz Communication)

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19 pages, 1398 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Transceiver Optimization for mmWave Line-of-Sight MIMO Systems Using Hybrid Arrays

by Junwen Deng, Hang Li, Jian Andrew Zhang, Xiaojing Huang and Zhiqun Cheng

Micromachines 2023, 14(2), 236; https://doi.org/10.3390/mi14020236 - 17 Jan 2023

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1271

Abstract

The performance of millimeter wave (mmWave) line-of-sight multiple input multiple output (LOS MIMO) systems using hybrid arrays of planar subarrays was studied. We characterized the achievable maximum spatial multiplexing gain for such LOS MIMO systems by the measures of spectral efficiency and effective degree of freedom (EDoF). By proposing a joint plane-wave and spherical-wave-based general 3D channel model, we derived the optimal design parameters in the analog domain, i.e., the optimal subarray separation products, and analyzed their sensitivity on the system performance. We also gave analytical eigenvalue expressions of the equivalent LOS MIMO channel matrix, which are applicable to the case of a non-optimal design, as well as the upper and lower bounds of the EDoF for system performance evaluation. A piecewise uniform quantization codebook was further designed for quantizing phase shifter values in practical applications. The numerical and simulation results show that planar subarrays are superior to traditional arrays in terms of spectral efficiency and EDoF in Ricean fading channels because they are more robust to the change in the communication distance and the deviation from the optimal design. The use of hybrid arrays of planar subarrays effectively removes the limitation of mmWave LOS MIMO systems using traditional arrays, through which, the conventional Rayleigh distance criterion has to be satisfied to achieve the optimal performance. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Wireless Transceiver Design for RF/MM Waves and THz Communication)

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25 pages, 8176 KiB

Open AccessArticle

An Efficient 24–30 GHz GaN-on-Si Driver Amplifier Using Synthesized Matching Networks

by Lin Peng, Jing Yan, Zhihao Zhang and Gary Zhang

Micromachines 2023, 14(1), 175; https://doi.org/10.3390/mi14010175 - 10 Jan 2023

Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2024

Abstract

This paper presents a broadband GaN microwave monolithic integrated circuit driver amplifier (MMIC DA) with compact dimensions of 1.65 mm × 0.78 mm for 5G millimeter-wave communication. The optimal impedance domain satisfying the preset goals was first acquired using the simplified load-pull procedure and small-signal simulations, followed by a weighted average method to determine the reference center matching point from which the optimal intrinsic load can be deduced. By means of de-embedding load-pull contours, modeling based on theoretical analysis, and simulation fitting for parameter identification, the nonlinear output capacitance and a series RLC model circuit approximating the input impedance response of the stabilized transistor were extracted. Under the design principle of fully absorbing the parasitic parameters of the device, explicit formulas and tabulated methods related to the Chebyshev impedance transformer were applied to construct filter-based synthesized matching networks at each stage and finally convert them into an implementable mixed-element form via the single-frequency equivalence technique. Measured on-wafer pulsed results for the proposed two-stage DA across 24–30 GHz demonstrated up to 31.1 dBm of saturated output power (P_sat) with less than 1 dB total fluctuation, 19.3 ± 1 dB of small-signal gain, and 39.8% of peak power-added efficiency (PAE) at the mid-frequency. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Wireless Transceiver Design for RF/MM Waves and THz Communication)

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15 pages, 5518 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Multi-Band Power Amplifier Module with Back-Off Efficiency Improvement using Ultra-Compact 3D Vertical Stack Multi-Chip Package for Cellular Handsets

by Zhihao Zhang, Jing Li, Lin Peng and Bo Sun

Micromachines 2022, 13(11), 1976; https://doi.org/10.3390/mi13111976 - 15 Nov 2022

Viewed by 1823

Abstract

A highly integrated multi-mode multi-band (MMMB) power amplifier module (PAM) using hybrid bulk complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS), gallium arsenide (GaAs) heterojunction bipolar transistor (HBT), and silicon-on-insulator (SOI) technologies for low band (LB, 824–915 MHz) and high band (HB, 1710–1980 MHz) is proposed. The hybrid MMMB PAM integrates a bulk CMOS controller die, a GaAs HBT power amplifier (PA) die and a SOI switch die on a six-layer laminate. To simultaneously obtain both highly efficient and highly linear characteristics over a wide range of input power levels, a parallel dual-chain PA strategy has been adopted to provide vary bias current and gain for low-power mode (LPM) and high-power mode (HPM) operation. Additionally, a broadband two-section low-pass output matching network design based on the suppression of high-order harmonics is proposed for enhanced efficiency and linearity. In order to achieve further miniaturization, a three-dimensional (3D) die stack multi-chip module (MCM) packaging structure, where the presented CMOS controller die is stacked vertically on the GaAs HBT PA die, is implemented. The measurement results show that the fabricated MMMB PAM achieves 26.1–27 dB of power gains and 38–38.4% of PAEs at an output power (Pout) of 28 dBm in the HPM, and 20.4–20.9 dB of power gains and 12.4–13.8% of PAEs at Pout of 17 dBm in the LPM over LB. For HB, power gains of 24.3–26.7 dB while maintaining PAEs of 38.2–39.9% at Pout of 28 dBm, and power gains of 15.9–17.5 dB while maintaining PAEs of 12.3–12.8% at Pout of 17 dBm are realized in the HPM and LPM, respectively. The fabricated PAM covering five frequency bands and operating at two power modes only occupies a 5 × 3.5 mm² area. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this work is the first demonstration of a MMMB PAM adopting an ultra-compact 3D vertical stack MCM package with favorable RF performance. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Wireless Transceiver Design for RF/MM Waves and THz Communication)

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