A Dual-Conversion Front-End with a W-Band First Intermediate Frequency for 1-30 GHz Reconfigurable Transceivers

We present a microwave dual-conversion front-ends with a W-band first intermediate frequency (IF) for 1-30 GHz reconfigurable transceivers. The front-end consists of frequency up-conversion and down-conversion ICs using base-collector diode mixers and 4:1 local oscillator (LO) frequency multipliers. The front-ends are implemented in a 130 nm InP HBT technology. The IC was designed for a broadly tunable 1-30 GHz dual-conversion receiver using a W-band first IF. The up-conversion IC has 4-7 dB conversion loss and 20-25 dBm IIP3 from 0.1-22 GHz to W-band. Similarly, the down-conversion IC has 4-7 dB conversion loss and 20-25 dBm IIP3 converting from W-band to a 0.1-22 GHz baseband or 2nd IF. The front-end has 30 GHz spurious free RF tuning range, with >6 dBm IIP3 using commercial off the shelf (COTS) off wafer IF filter and IF amplifier. It consumes 2.8W in the down-conversion and 3W in the up-conversion.