A Current Bleeding CMOS Mixer Featuring LO Amplification Based on Current-Reused Topology

Abstract

A double balanced Gilbert-cell class-A amplifier bleeding mixer (DBGC CAAB mixer) is proposed and implemented. The injection current is utilized to amplify the local oscillator (LO) signal to improve the performance of the transconductor stage. The DBGC CAAB mixer achieves a conversion gain of 17.5 dB at -14 dBm LO power, and the noise figure is suppressed from 45 dB to 10.7 dB. It is important to stress that the new configuration will not drain additional power in contrast to the former current bleeding mixers. This topology dramatically relieves the requirement of the LO power. The DBGC CAAB mixer is implemented by using 0.18-μm RFCMOS technology and operates at the 2.4 GHz ISM application with 10 MHz intermediate frequency. The power consumption is 12 mA at 1.5 V supply voltage. The DBGC CAAB mixer features the highest FOM figure within a wide range of LO power.

Share and Cite:

W. Lee, K. Tsang, Y. Shen and K. Chui, "A Current Bleeding CMOS Mixer Featuring LO Amplification Based on Current-Reused Topology," Circuits and Systems, Vol. 4 No. 1, 2013, pp. 58-66. doi: 10.4236/cs.2013.41010.

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

References

[1] K. Chang, I. Bahl and V. Nair, “RF and Microwave Circuit and Component Design for Wireless Systems,” Wiley-Interscience, New York, 2002.
[2] H. Darabi and A. A. Abidi, “Noise in RF CMOS Mixers: A Simple Physical Model,” IEEE Journal of Solid State Circuits, Vol. 35, No. 1, 2000, pp. 15-25. doi:10.1109/4.818916
[3] D. Manstretta, R. Castello and F. Svelto, “Low 1/f Noise CMOS Active Mixers for Direct Conversion,” IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems II, Vol. 48, 2001, pp. 846-850. doi:10.1109/82.964998
[4] H. Darabi and J. Chiu, “A Noise Cancellation Technique in Active RF-CMOS Mixers,” IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, Vol. 40, No. 12, 2005, pp. 2628-2632. doi:10.1109/JSSC.2005.857428
[5] M. T. Terrovitis and R. G. Meyer, “Noise in Current Commutating CMOS Mixers,” IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, Vol. 34, 1999, pp. 772-783. doi:10.1109/4.766811
[6] M. Krcmar, V. Subramanian, M. Jamal Deen and G. Boeck, “High Gain Low Noise Folded CMOS Mixer,” European Conference on Wireless Technology, Amsterdam, 27-28 October 2008, pp. 13-16.
[7] V. Vidojkovic, J. Van der Tang, A. L. Leeuwenburgh and A. van Roermund, “A High Gain, Low Voltage Folded-Switching Mixer with Current-Reuse in 0.18 μm CMOS,” IEEE Digest of Papers. Radio Frequency Integrated Circuits (RFIC) Symposium, Fort Worth, 6-8 June 2004, pp. 31-34.
[8] J. Harvey and R. Harjani, “Analysis and Design of an Integrated Quadrature Mixer with Improved Noise, Gain and Image Rejection,” The 2001 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems, Vol. 4, Sydney, 6-9 May 2001, pp. 786-789.
[9] B. Gilbert, “The Micromixer: A Highly Linear Variant of the Gilbert Mixer Using a Bisymmetric Class-AB Input Stage,” IEEE Journal of Solid-state Circuits, Vol. 32, No. 9, 1997, pp. 1412-1423. doi:10.1109/4.628753
[10] M. L. Schmatz, C. Biber and W. Baumberger, “Conversion Gain Enhancement Technique for Ultra Low Power Gilbert Cell Down Mixers,” 17th Annual IEEE Gallium Arsenide Integrated Circuit (GaAs IC) Symposium, San Diego, 29 October-1 November 1995, pp. 245-248.
[11] G. Z. Fatin, M. S. Oskooei and Z. D. K. Kanani, “A Technique to Improve Noise Figure and Conversion Gain of CMOS Mixers,” 50th Midwest Symposium on Circuits and Systems, Montreal, 5-8 August 2007, pp. 437-440.
[12] J. Yoon, H. Kim, C. Park, J. Yang, H. Song, S. Lee and B. Kim, “A New RF CMOS Gilbert Mixer with Improved Noise Figure and Linearity,” IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques, Vol. 56, No. 3, 2008, pp. 626-631.
[13] J. Lerdworatawee and W. Namgoong, “Generalized Linear Periodic Time-Varying Analysis for Noise Reduction in an Active Mixer,” IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, Vol. 42, No. 6, 2007, pp. 1339-135.
[14] T. Melly, A.-S. Porret, C. C. Enz and E. A. Vittoz, “An Analysis of Flicker Noise Rejection in Low-Power and Low-Voltage CMOS Mixers,” IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, Vol. 36, No. 1, 2001, pp. 102-109.
[15] L. A. MacEachern and T. Manku, “A Charge-Injection Method for Gilbert cell Biasing,” IEEE Canidian Conference on Electrical and Computer Engingeering, Waterloo, 24-28 May 1998, pp. 365-368.
[16] S. G. Lee and J. K. Choi, “Current-Reuse Bleeding Mixer,” Electronics Letters, Vol. 36, No. 8, 2000, pp. 696-697. doi:10.1049/el:20000556
[17] K. Xuan, K. F. Tsang, S. C. Lee and W. C. Lee, “High-Performance Current Bleeding CMOS Mixer,” Electronics Letters, Vol. 45, No. 19, 2009, pp. 979-981.
[18] B. Razavi, “Design of Analog CMOS Integrated Circuits,” McGraw-Hill, New York, 2001.
[19] D. K. Shaeffer and T. H. Lee, “A 1.5-V, 1.5-GHz CMOS Low Noise Amplifier,” IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, Vol. 32, No. 5, 1997, pp. 745-759. doi:10.1109/4.568846
[20] V. Vidojkovic, J. Van der Tang, A. Leeuwenburgh and A. H. M. Van Roermund, “A Low-Voltage Folded-Switching Mixer in 0.18-μm CMOS,” IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, Vol. 40, No. 6, 2005, pp. 1259-1264.
[21] C. Hermann, M. Tiebout and H. Klar, “A 0.6-V 1.6-mW Transformer-Based 2.5-GHz Down Conversion Mixer with +5.4-dB Gain and -2.8-dBm IIP3 in 0.13-μm CMOS,” IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques, Vol. 53, No. 2, 2005, pp. 488-495.
[22] J. Park, C.-HO Lee, B.-S. Kim, and J. Laskar, “Design and Analysis of Low Flicker-Noise CMOS Mixers for Direct-Conversion Receivers,” IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques, Vol. 54, No. 12, 2006, pp. 4372-4380.
[23] P. J. Sulivan, B. A. Xavier and W. H. Ku, “Low Voltage Performance of a Microwave CMOS Gilbert Cell Mixer,” IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, Vol. 32, No. 7, 1997, pp. 1151-1155.

Copyright © 2024 by authors and Scientific Research Publishing Inc.

Creative Commons License

This work and the related PDF file are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.