A 190.3‐dBc/Hz FoM 16‐GHz rotary travelling‐wave oscillator with reliable direction control

Abstract

Abstract This letter presents a rotary travelling‐wave oscillator (RTWO) with reliable direction control in a standard 130 nm complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS) technology. To achieve low phase noise (PN), and low power consumption, 16‐stages customised transmission line segments are designed and simulated on electromagnetic tools. The PN is investigated through modelling the RTWO as multiple standing‐wave oscillators. The proposed oscillator achieves 11.2% tuning range, 190.3 dBc/Hz figure‐of‐merit (FoM) at 1 MHz offset and 192.3 dBc/Hz FoM at 10 MHz offset with 5.8‐mW power consumption from 16‐GHz carrier.

Keywords

• Analogue circuit design, modelling and testing
• Oscillators
• Microwave integrated circuits
• Travelling wave tubes
• Semiconductor integrated circuit design, layout, modelling and testing
• CMOS integrated circuits