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The effect of temperature on thermoelectric microwave power sensors is researched in order to extend its application field. The fabrication of this microwave power sensor is divided into a front side and a back side processing using GaAs MMIC process and MEMS technology. The measurement results show that the temperature has a significant effect on the performance of thermoelectric microwave power sensors. The obtained temperature coefficient is about 0.488 mV/(W · K), which has an important reference value for the thermoelectric microwave power sensors. The reason is that the accuracy of microwave power measurement will be realised as long as the environment temperature is tracked.

A new compact Ka-band rat-race coupler (RRC) is proposed and fabricated in the 0.15-μm GaAs pHEMTs process. Since the developed RRC is implemented by asymmetrical coplanar-waveguide T-structures, it has a compact circuit footprint and a return-loss bandwidth similar to that of the conventional coupler. Besides, a short-circuited quarter-wave stub is attached into the ring of the RRC to flatten the output phase responses. The developed coupler has a 47.28% 10-dB return-loss bandwidth and only occupies a 20.89% circuit size of the conventional one. By considering the 180° ± 5° phase difference, the frequency range covers from 28.73 to 39.53 GHz with a 31.6% relative bandwidth. Over this frequency range, the amplitude imbalance varies from − 0.269 to 0.8 dB.

A physics based model using Wheelers incremental inductance rule for calculating the change in inductance due to variations in line width and thickness for planar circular spiral inductors is given. It is shown that the series resistance of an MMIC inductor can be used as a figure of merit for the robustness of the inductor against etching variations in line width during fabrication. Circular inductors are shown to have less inductance variation than rectangular inductors. This model can be evaluated quickly using a circuit simulator without the need for expensive EM analysis. In the electromagnetic modeling of MMIC inductors, a fine grid and several sheets are used to accurately model the current distribution and determine the resistance. SonnetTM is used to accurately model the 3D characteristics of thick conductors such as loss and effects of physically thick metal. A procedure based on the Richardson extrapolation method is used to extract the resistance values without long computation time. Applications include calculating the change in inductance due to overor under-etching of metal lines during fabrication. For 2 to 4 turn inductors with variations in line width of +/-20% of the nominal width, the average variation in modeled inductance is within 8% of the EM simulated variation.

The development and design of the Ku‐band automatic tracking system are based on MIC, waveguide, and MMIC technologies. The power divider and combiners in the power amplifier module are waveguide power combiners to minimize losses in the transmitter. Packed MMIC components are used to minimize system volume and weight. The tracking monopulse system consists of antennas, low‐noise amplifier (LNA), phase comparator array, and a controller. The RF head goal is to receive and transmit X‐band RF signals via monopulse micro‐strip antenna. The RF signal is downconverted to 60 MHz. The RF head may be employed in combined electromagnetic and optical seekers. The development and design of the X‐band RF head are based on MIC and MMIC technology. The antenna array has four output ports: sum, azimuth difference, elevation difference, and guard. The antenna output is connected to the RF head input ports.

This chapter presents the block diagram of an integrated outdoor unit (ODU) for mm‐wave satellite communication applications. The ODU consists of a receiving and a transmitting channel. The outdoor system is divided into three main parts: the transmitter, the “ODU;” the antenna assembly; and the receiver front end, the “LNB”. The LNB is of universal standard and one with a circular C‐120 flange at the input. The module is an integral MIC assembly, which includes the upconverter, SSPA, output power detector, and transition to the antenna. The key element for the realization of the ODU solid state power amplifier (SSPA) is the output stage basic MMIC power amplifier. The chapter describes the design and performance of the new compact and low‐cost Ka‐band power amplifiers. MIC, MMIC, and waveguide technologies are combined in the development and fabrication of this set of power amplifiers.

Printed antennas are the perfect antenna solution for wireless and medical communication systems. Printed antennas possess attractive features such as low profile, light‐weight, small volume, and low production cost. These features are crucial for wireless compact wearable communication systems. In addition, the benefit of a compact low‐cost feed network is attained by integrating the feed structure with the radiating elements on the same substrate. Printed antennas are used in communication systems that employ MIC and MMIC technologies. Two layers stacked microstrip antennas provide a wider bandwidth. Loop antennas are used as receive antennas in communication and medical systems. Loop antennas may be printed on a dielectric substrate or manufactured as a wired antenna. The wire loop antenna has very low radiation efficiency. The planar inverted‐F antenna (PIFA) possess attractive features such as low profile, small size, and low fabrication costs.

This chapter contains sections titled: Introduction Hybrid and monolithic integrated circuits Basic MMIC elements Simulation models and layout libraries MMIC production technique RFIC Bibliography

This article presents a 12b 500MS/s successive‐approximation‐register‐assisted pipeline analogue‐to‐digital converter. By adopting a new auto‐zero scheme, a calibration‐free four‐stage ring residue amplifier with a small offset cancellation capacitor is proposed. In addition, the coarse‐analogue‐to‐digital converter of the second stage is embedded into the amplification phase, which relaxes the comparison periods of the first and second stages by 25.0% and 17.4%, respectively. Post‐simulated in 28‐nm CMOS technology with a 0.9 V supply, the analogue‐to‐digital converter achieves 62.2 dB SNDR and 78.1 dB SFDR. It consumes 8.45 mW with an on‐chip reference voltage buffer, resulting in Schreier's figure of merit (FoMS) of 166.9 dB. This article introduces a new scheme to fulfil four‐stage ringamp as a potential choice to reach both high gain and high speed. Besides, the coarse‐ADC‐embedded structure allows 3‐b comparison without occupying the timing of the next pipeline stage. These two techniques are adopted in the proposed pipelined ADC and push the power and area efficiency for high performance.

Millimetre wave (mmWave) has been a popular research topic in recent years. Termination loads are useful for RF components and integrated circuits. Commercially available terminators are expensive and not easily applicable for integration to MMICs. In this letter, a wideband, high‐performance, and cost‐effective microstrip termination load is proposed based on the combination of a printed monopole antenna and an absorber sheet. The results show an excellent matched termination between 20 and 67 GHz that can be used as integrated with microstrip lines in RF circuits and MMICs and as loaded dummy ports for test and measurements for mmWave applications. The proposed high‐quality termination is compact and cost‐effectively competitive with commercial products. This work intends to design a microstrip high quality and cheap termination load for both test/measurement purposes (with connector) and also integration to MMICs. The design idea utilizes the printed wideband monopole antenna and absorber material coming up with a novel design methodology. A comparison of this work with other high ranked recent literary works is provided and shows the advantage of the proposed termination load in terms of bandwidth, simplicity and cost.

We report broadband (20 GHz ‐ 40 GHz) low‐noise amplifiers in a cascode topology using graded‐channel GaN HEMTs, resulting in an excellent NF figure down to 1 dB with 15 dB gain.