Realization of mm-Wave MMIC Frequency Doubler for Astronomical Applications

• Published in: IEEE microwave and wireless technology letters (Print) Vol. 34; no. 3; pp. 334 - 337
• Main Authors: Bhattacharya, Anamiya, Bhattacharyya, Shrija, Shaik, Latheef A., Tolani, Harshita, Chakraborty, Prantik, Rao, Ch. V. N.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Piscataway IEEE 01.03.2024; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Configuration management; Conversion efficiency; Dimensional analysis; Dimensional tolerances; Energy conversion efficiency; Extraterrestrial measurements; Frequencies; Frequency conversion; frequency doubler; Frequency doublers; Gallium arsenide; Integrated circuits; Microwave circuits; Millimeter waves; MMIC (circuits); monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC); Power generation; Power measurement; Schottky barrier diode (SBD); Schottky diodes; Sensitivity analysis; Substrates; waveguide split-block; Waveguides
• ISSN: 2771-957X; 2771-9588
• DOI: 10.1109/LMWT.2024.3351861

This letter presents the design and characterization of a 52-60-GHz monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) based frequency doubler using Schottky barrier diodes (SBDs) on a 25-<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">\mu \text{m} </tex-math></inline-formula> thick GaAs substrate. An improved MMIC configuration with eight diodes provides continuous high output power with high efficiency. The design is fabricated and housed in an <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">E </tex-math></inline-formula>-plane split block waveguide structure. The fabricated prototype evinces a peak efficiency of 37.2% and output power of 186.2 mW with an input power of 500 mW at 57 GHz. The design provides measured 3-dB output power bandwidth of ~22% (50-62 GHz). To the best of the authors' knowledge, the proposed design with a comparatively smaller circuit size, provides highest continuous output power and conversion efficiency at this frequency band. Moreover, design is less sensitive to the dimensional tolerances which has been demonstrated through sensitivity analysis and repeated measurements over several blocks.