K-Band SiGe System-on-Chip Radiometric Receiver for Remote Sensing of the Atmosphere

• Published in: IEEE transactions on circuits and systems. I, Regular papers Regular papers, 2017-12, Vol.64 (12), p.3025-3035
• Main Authors: Aluigi, Luca, Pepe, Domenico, Alimenti, Federico, Zito, Domenico
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Atmosphere; Atmospheric measurements; BiCMOS integrated circuits; Detectors; low-noise amplifiers; microwave integrated circuits; Microwave radiometry; Millimeter waves; Miniaturization; Radiometers; Receivers; Remote sensing; Remote sensors; Silicon germanium; System on chip; Technology assessment; Temperature measurement; temperature sensors; Weight reduction
• ISSN: 1549-8328; 1558-0806
• DOI: 10.1109/TCSI.2017.2761703

System-on-chip (SoC) miniaturization of radiometric sensors could dramatically improve quantitatively the study of Earth's atmosphere in the microwave- and millimeter-wave frequency regions, enabling cost and weight reductions both for ground- and space-based observation instruments. This paper reports the analysis, design, implementation, and experimental characterization of the first K-band SoC Dicke radiometric receiver implemented in a commercial silicon-germanium technology under Space evaluations. The radiometric receiver exhibits a responsivity of about 760 kV/W and a noise equivalent power of about 232 fW/√Hz at the center frequency of 25.75 GHz. For a bandwidth of 2.5 GHz, the system achieves a resolution of 9 K for a relatively short integration time (1 s), 2.8 K for a medium integration time (10 s), and 0.9 K for a relatively long integration time (100 s).