A Dual-Band 28/38-GHz Power Amplifier With Inter-Band Suppression in 22-nm FD-SOI CMOS for Multi-Standard mm-Wave 5G Communications

TL;DR

This paper introduces a dual-band 28/38-GHz power amplifier with inter-band suppression for 5G millimeter-wave communications, utilizing a novel transformer network and resonator design in 22-nm FD-SOI CMOS.

Contribution

It presents a new dual-band PA design with inter-band suppression using a center-tapped transformer and resonator, optimized for 5G applications in advanced CMOS technology.

Findings

Achieves over 22 dBm saturated output power at both bands

Provides 6 dB inter-band suppression at 33 GHz

Attains high efficiency of around 33% PAE at both frequencies

Abstract

In this article, we present a dual-band 28/38-GHz power amplifier (PA) with inter-band suppression for millimeter-wave 5G communications. The dual-band operation is achieved using a center-tapped transformer network with an extra resonator which can provide optimum load impedance of the transistor in the two bands and synthesize a short-circuit between the two bands. This feature suppresses the PA signal emissions in the inter band, commonly allocated for other applications. A design procedure is developed for the proposed matching network including physical limits on the quality factor and the coupling coefficient of the transformer. The PA is designed using a 22-nm fully-depleted silicon-on-insulator (FD-SOI) CMOS process. The transistor stacking and a four-path transformer parallel-series power combining techniques are used to achieve high output power using the low-voltage process. The PA achieves simulated performance of 22.6/22.0 dBm saturated output power, 19.8/20.0 dBm output power at 1-dB gain compression, and 33/32 % maximum power-added efficiency (PAE) at 28/38 GHz. The inter-band suppression is 6 dB at 33 GHz.