A K-band up/down bidirectional mixer in 130 nm CMOS

Abstract

An active bidirectional mixer performing the up/down conversion is proposed at K-band with a 130 nm CMOS in this paper. The mixer performs the down conversion in the Rx mode and converts the radio frequency(RF) signal amplified by low noise amplifier(LNA) into the intermediate frequency(IF) signal, whereas carries out the up conversion in the Tx mode and shifts the baseband(BB) signal up to the RF signal for the power amplifier(PA). Post-simulation results shows that with 0 dBm local oscillator(LO) drives, the mixer achieves the conversion gain(CG), noise figure(NF), and output 1 dB compression point(OP1dB) of -1.1~ -0.4 dB, 12.9~13.3 dB from 23 to 25 GHz, and -8.2 dBm@24 GHz in up-conversion mode, respectively. In down-conversion mode, the mixer exhibits the CG, NF, and iutput 1 dB compression point(IP1dB) of 2.4~3.4 dB, 15.2~15.6 dB from 23 to 25 GHz, and -3.6 dBm@24 GHz, respectively. The chip area is 0.6 mm2, which consumes 12 mW from a supply of 1.5 V.

Keywords

• up/down bidirectional mixer
• k-band
• cmos
• active balun