Multilayer Design Techniques for Extremely Miniaturized CMOS Microwave and Millimeter-Wave Distributed Passive Circuits

• Published in: IEEE transactions on microwave theory and techniques 2006-12, Vol.54 (12), p.4218-4224
• Main Authors: Chirala, M.K., Nguyen, C.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Applied sciences; Circuit properties; Circuits; CMOS; CMOS radio-frequency integrated circuits (RFICs); couplers; Coupling circuits; Design. Technologies. Operation analysis. Testing; Electric, optical and optoelectronic circuits; Electronic circuits; Electronic tubes, masers; Electronics; Exact sciences and technology; hairpin resonator; Integrated circuits; Joining; Lange coupler; Microstrip resonators; microwave and millimeter-wave circuits; Microwave circuits; Microwave circuits, microwave integrated circuits, microwave transmission lines, submillimeter wave circuits; Microwave theory and techniques; Microwaves; Millimeter wave circuits; Millimeter wave technology; multilayer circuits; Multilayers; Noise levels; Nonhomogeneous media; Oscillators, resonators, synthetizers; Passive circuits; Quality factor; Radio frequency; Resonators; ring hybrid; Semiconductor device measurement; Semiconductor electronics. Microelectronics. Optoelectronics. Solid state devices; slow-wave structures
• ISSN: 0018-9480; 1557-9670
• DOI: 10.1109/TMTT.2006.885567

Multilayer design techniques are investigated for reducing the size and enhancing the performance of microwave and millimeter-wave distributed circuits in CMOS. Various distributed passive circuits are implemented in a standard 0.25-mum RF/mixed-signal process, including a novel broadside-coupled Lange coupler, a microstrip ring hybrid, and a hairpin resonator incorporating a complementary slow-wave structure. The broadside-coupled Lange coupler exhibits -3.3 to -3.35 dB through, -3.3 to -3.7 dB coupling, more than 12-dB isolation, and 15-dB return loss across 25-35 GHz while occupying only 217 times185 mum of chip area. The multilayer ring hybrid has -3.1 to -3.18 dB through, -5.1 to -5.7 dB coupling, and more than 17-dB isolation and 10-dB return loss from 25-35 GHz while occupying 282 times314 mum. A slow-wave structure based on multilayer complementary design principle is implemented for hairpin resonators. The measured quality factor of the multilayer complementary slow-wave hairpin resonator increases to about 14.5 from 11.3 for a similar sized resonator with a single-layer slow-wave structure, while retaining similar size-reduction properties as the latter