Flexible Baseband Analog Circuits for Software-Defined Radio Front-Ends

This paper presents a novel approach to design a digitally programmable low pass filter (LPF) and variable gain amplifier (VGA) intended for a software-defined radio (SDR) front-end. These flexible analog circuits are driven by a network-on-chip (NoC) that is able to set performance parameters like...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:IEEE journal of solid-state circuits 2007-07, Vol.42 (7), p.1501-1512
Main Authors: Giannini, V., Craninckx, J., D'Amico, S., Baschirotto, A.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Active- G_{m} -RC
Amplifiers
Analog circuits
Applied sciences
Baseband
Circuit noise
Circuit properties
CMOS analog integrated circuits
CMOS technology
continuous-time filters
Cutoff frequency
Design engineering
Digital circuits
direct conversion
Electric potential
Electric, optical and optoelectronic circuits
Electronic circuits
Electronics
Exact sciences and technology
Frequency filters
Gain
Integrated circuits
Low pass filters
Network-on-a-chip
Noise levels
Performance gain
programmable filters
programmable op-amps
Radio
Radiofrequency amplifiers
Rauch
Silicon
single amplifier biquadratic cells
software-defined radio
Tuning
variable gain amplifier
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:This paper presents a novel approach to design a digitally programmable low pass filter (LPF) and variable gain amplifier (VGA) intended for a software-defined radio (SDR) front-end. These flexible analog circuits are driven by a network-on-chip (NoC) that is able to set performance parameters like cut-off frequency, selectivity, noise, and gain guaranteeing at any time a near-optimal power/performance trade-off. A design approach is proposed to tackle the challenges imposed by flexibility in analog design. A silicon prototype is realized in 0.13-mum CMOS technology with 1.2-V supply voltage to prove the validity of the proposed solution. The LPF provides a frequency tuning range between 0.35 MHz and 23.5 MHz with an adaptive integrated noise level between 85 muVrms and 163 muVrms whereby the power consumption conveniently varies from 0.72 mW to 21.6 mW according to the required performance. The VGA is made up of two cascaded gain stages and provides a gain range from about 0 dB to 39 dB with a reconfigurable power/bandwidth.
ISSN:0018-9200
1558-173X
DOI:10.1109/JSSC.2007.899103