Electromagnetic Wave Group - Advanced Microwave and RF-SOP Technology

60-GHz four-element phased-array transmit/receive system-in-package using phase compensation techniques in 65nm flip-chip CMOS process

• Author
  J.-L. Kuo, Y.-F. Lu, T.-Y. Huang, Y.-L. Chang, Y.-K. Hsieh, P.-J. Peng, I-C. Chang, T. C. Tsai, K.-Y. Kao, W.-Y. Hsiung, J. Wang, Y. A. Hsu, K.-Y. Lin, H.-C. Lu, Y.-C. Lin, L.-H. Lu, T.-W. Huang, R.-B. Wu, and H. Wang
• Published in
  IEEE Trans. Microw. Theory Tech., vol. 60, no. 3
• Time
  Mar 01, 2012
• Abstract

  A 60-GHz four-element phased-array transmit/receive (TX/RX) system-in-package antenna modules with phase-compensated techniques in 65-nm CMOS technology are presented. The design is based on the all-RF architecture with 4-bit RF switched LC phase shifters, phase compensated variable gain amplifier (VGA), 4:1 Wilkinson power combining/dividing network, variable-gain low-noise amplifier, power amplifier, 6-bit unary digital-to-analog converter, bias circuit, electrostatic discharge protection, and digital control interface (DCI). The 2 × 2 TX/RX phased arrays have been packaged with four antennas in low-temperature co-fired ceramic modules through flip-chip bonding and underfill process and phased-array beam steering have been demonstrated. The entire beam-steering functions are digitally controllable, and individual registers are integrated at each front-end to enable beam steering through the DCI. The four-element TX array results in an output P_1dB of 5 dBm per channel. The four-element RX array results in an average gain of 25 dB per channel. The four-element array consumes 400 mW in TX and 180 mW in RX and occupies an area of 3.74 mm² in the TX integrated circuit (IC) and 4.18 mm² in the RX IC. The beam-steering measurement results show acceptable agreement of the synthesized and measured array pattern.