Recent advancements in transistor technology, such as the 35 nm InP HEMT, allow for the development of monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) low noise amplifiers (LNAs) with performance ...properties that challenge the hegemony of SIS mixers as leading radio astronomy detectors at frequencies as high as 116 GHz. In particular, for the Atacama Large Millimeter and Submillimeter Array (ALMA), this technical advancement allows the combination of two previously defined bands, 2 (67-90 GHz) and 3 (84-116 GHz), into a single ultra-broadband 2+3 (67-116 GHz) receiver. With this purpose, we present the design, implementation, and characterization of LNAs suitable for operation in this new ALMA band 2+3, and also a different set of LNAs for ALMA band 2. The best LNAs reported here show a noise temperature less than 250 K from 72 to 104 GHz at room temperature, and less than 28 K from 70 to 110 GHz at cryogenic ambient temperature of 20 K. To the best knowledge of the authors, this is the lowest wideband noise ever published in the 70-110 GHz frequency range, typically designated as W-band.
An MMIC Low-Noise Amplifier Design Technique Varonen, Mikko; Reeves, Rodrigo; Kangaslahti, Pekka ...
IEEE transactions on microwave theory and techniques,
03/2016, Letnik:
64, Številka:
3
Journal Article
Recenzirano
In this paper we discuss the design of low-noise amplifiers (LNAs) for both cryogenic and room-temperature operation in general and take the stability and linearity of the amplifiers into special ...consideration. Oscillations that can occur within a multi-finger transistor are studied and verified with simulations and measurements. To overcome the stability problem related to the multi-finger transistor design approach a parallel two-finger unit transistor monolithic microwave integrated circuit LNA design technique, which enables the design of wideband and high-linearity LNAs with very stable, predictable, and repeatable operation, is proposed. The feasibility of the proposed design technique is proved by demonstrating a three-stage LNA packaged in a WR10 waveguide housing and fabricated using a 35-nm InP HEMT technology that achieves more than a 20-dB gain from 75 to 116 GHz and 26-33-K noise temperature from 85 to 116 GHz when cryogenically cooled to 27 K.
NASA's Planetary Decadal Survey Vision and Voyages has concluded that measurements of isotopic cometary water vapor, and in particular the deuterium-to-hydrogen ratio (D/H) ratio, are an important ...tool for unraveling the mysteries involving the origin of Earth's water, and the evolution of our solar system. To support this goal, we have developed, through an internal Jet Propulsion Laboratory research program, quantum-limited superconductor insulator superconductor (SIS) receivers covering the important 500-600 GHz submillimeter frequency band. These instruments can detect the (1 10 -1 01 ) HDO rotational transition, and the (1 10 -1 01 ) ground state (rotational) transitions of Ortho H 2 16 O, H 2 17 O, and H 2 18 O with exquisite sensitivity. However, given the extremely weak HDO emission and the time-variability of the outgassing processes in comets, expeditious low noise D/H ratio measurements of these sources remain extremely challenging. To address this issue, we investigate the possibility of acquiring HDO, H 2 17 O, and H 2 18 O simultaneously by means of a novel dual local oscillator (2LO) down-conversion process, as an alternative to ultra-broadband IF bandwidth systems.
NASA's Planetary Science Decadal Survey has concluded that isotopic measurements of cometary water vapor are a means to unraveling the mysteries involving the origin of Earth's water and the ...evolution of our solar system. To support this, a recent Jet Propulsion Laboratory internal research program has developed quantum limited superconductor-insulator-superconductor (SIS) receivers in the important 500<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">-</tex-math></inline-formula>600 GHz submillimeter frequency band. These instruments can be used to detect the deuterated water (HDO) ground state (1<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_{10}</tex-math></inline-formula>-1<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_{01}</tex-math></inline-formula>), H<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_2^{16}</tex-math></inline-formula>O ortho ground state (1<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_{10}</tex-math></inline-formula>-1<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_{01}</tex-math></inline-formula>), and the oxygen isotopologues H<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_2^{17}</tex-math></inline-formula>O and H<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_2^{18}</tex-math></inline-formula>O with exquisite sensitivity. To achieve the presented results, we have investigated aluminum oxide (AlO<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_x</tex-math></inline-formula>) and aluminum nitride (AlN<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_x</tex-math></inline-formula>) barrier SIS tunnel junction mixers on the 6-<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">\mu</tex-math></inline-formula>m silicon-on-insulator substrate. The AlO<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_x</tex-math></inline-formula> and AlN<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_x</tex-math></inline-formula> junction mixer blocks utilize diagonal and smooth-profile conical horns, respectively. In both cases, a commercial 4-8-GHz intermediate frequency low-noise amplifier (LNA) has been integrated into the mixer block. The AlO<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_x</tex-math></inline-formula> (low-current-density) barrier SIS junctions were fabricated with 2-<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">\mu</tex-math></inline-formula>m gold beam-lead technology, whereas in the case of the AlN<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_x</tex-math></inline-formula> SIS tunnel junction, we use capacitive RF decoupling tabs. The latter approach simplifies fabrication, increases yield, eases the mounting process, and facilitates scaling to higher frequencies. For an actual flight mission, with operation <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">\leq</tex-math></inline-formula>4.2 K, the allowed heat dissipation of the mixer-integrated LNA needs to be minimized. In this article, we also investigate the receiver sensitivity as a function of the LNA dc power consumption. We find that the dc power consumption of the LNA can be reduced to <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">\sim</tex-math></inline-formula>1.6 mW with minimal loss in sensitivity. It is anticipated that the continued InP HEMT development for quantum computer applications are likely to reduce the required LNA power dissipation even further.
Heterodyne mixers incorporating Nb SIS junctions and NbTiN-SiO/sub 2/-Al microstrip tuning circuits offer the lowest reported receiver noise temperatures to date in the 0.8-0.96- and 0.96-1.12-THz ...frequency bands. In particular, improvements in the quality of the NbTiN ground plane of the SIS devices' on-chip microstrip tuning circuits have yielded significant improvements in the sensitivity of the 0.96-1.12-THz mixers relative to previously presented results. Additionally, an optimized RF design incorporating a reduced-height waveguide and suspended stripline RF choke filter offers significantly larger operating bandwidths than were obtained with mixers that incorporated full-height waveguides near 1 THz. Finally, the impact of junction current density and quality on the performance of the 0.8-0.96-THz mixers is discussed and compared with measured mixer sensitivities, as are the relative sensitivities of the 0.8-0.96- and 0.96-1.12-THz mixers.
Accurate measurement of angular positions on the sky requires a well-defined system of reference, something that in practice is realized by the International Celestial Reference Frame (ICRF) with ...observations of distant (typical redshift <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">\sim</tex-math></inline-formula>1) Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN). At such great distances a subset of these objects exhibit as little as 10<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">-</tex-math></inline-formula>50 <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">\mu</tex-math></inline-formula>as/year observed parallax or proper motion, thus giving the frame excellent spatial and temporal stability. Until fairly recently the majority of AGN centered imaging was accomplished in the S (2.3 GHz) and X (8.4 GHz) radio frequency bands, however S-band observations for reasons such as sensitivity "plateauing", increased source structure (jets), and radio frequency interference (RFI) have become less productive. Following spacecraft telemetry moves to higher frequencies and a desire to strengthen JPL's leadership in defining the next-generation of celestial reference frames has motivated the development of a "Quad-band" prototype receiver that operates in X, Ku, K, and Ka band in both right hand (RCP) and left hand (LCP) circular polarization. The goal of this receiver is to achieve less than a 20 % increase in noise over the Jansky Very Large Array (JVLA, NRAO) performance specification, which in such a wide bandwidth represents a revolutionary capability. To evaluate the various technical developments of the 8 GHz<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">-</tex-math></inline-formula>40 GHz receiver the feedhorn optical beam was designed to interface to the US based Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA). The receiver's intermediate frequency (IF) spans 4 GHz<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">-</tex-math></inline-formula>8 GHz, giving rise to up to eight 4 GHz IF channels for a fully populated instrument. This paper outlines the technical development of a 2<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">^{1}</tex-math></inline-formula>/<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">_{2}</tex-math></inline-formula> octave wide (8 GHz<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">-</tex-math></inline-formula>40 GHz) X-Ka band prototype receiver, fulfilling a need for super broadband technology within the VLBI network. An important additional benefit of the wideband receiver approach is its simplicity and low cost of operation.
Millimeter and submillimeter indium phosphide (InP) microwave monolithic integrated circuits (MMICs) are increasingly used in applications spanning Earth science, astrophysics, and defense. In this ...paper, we characterize direct detection and heterodyne gain fluctuations of 35-, 30-, and 25-nm gate-length InP MMIC low-noise amplifiers (LNAs) designed for the 200-670-GHz frequency range. Of the twelve MMIC LNAs, five pairs have also been measured in multistage or cascaded configuration. In direct detection mode, the MMICs room temperature (RT) 1/f noise spectrum and responsivity were measured. From these the power spectral density, the noise equivalent temperature difference (NETD), equivalent system noise temperature (T sys DD ), and low-frequency normalized gain fluctuations (ΔG/G) are derived. On the same set of MMIC LNAs, using a heterodyne down conversion technique, the Allan variance method is applied to obtain the Allan stability time and normalized 4-8 GHz gain fluctuation noise at both RT and two cryogenic temperatures. We find in the case of 35-, 30-, and 25-nm gate-length InP MMIC LNAs that the derived direct detection and heterodyne gain stability is highly process dependent with only a secondary dependence on gate periphery, the number of gate fingers, and/or gain stages. This observation confirms the underlying solid-state physics understanding that gain fluctuation noise is the result of a temporal distribution of the generation and recombination of electron free carriers due to lattice defects and surface impurities. Upon cooling below ~66 K, it is observed that on average gain fluctuations increase by ≳2.2× and the Allan stability time decreases by ~2.5×. The presented measurement results compare favorably
The Caltech Submillimeter Observatory (CSO) is located on top of Mauna Kea, Hawaii, at an altitude of 4.2 km. The existing suite of facility heterodyne receivers covering the submillimeter band is ...rapidly aging and in need of replacement. To facilitate deep integrations and automated spectral line surveys, a family of remote programmable, synthesized, dual-frequency balanced receivers covering the astronomical important 180-720 GHz atmospheric windows is in an advanced stage of development. Installation of the first set of receivers is expected in the spring of 2012. Dual-frequency observation will be an important mode of operation offered by the new facility instrumentation. Two band observations are accomplished by separating the H and V polarizations of the incoming signal and routing them via folded optics to the appropriate polarization sensitive balanced mixer. Scientifically this observation mode facilitates pointing for the higher receiver band under mediocre weather conditions and a doubling of scientific throughput (2 × 4 GHz) under good weather conditions.
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