A high gain V-band power amplifier for 5G applications

Abstract

This paper presents a high gain millimeter-wave (mmW) power amplifier (PA) fabricated in a 55nm CMOS technology for V-band 5G wireless communication applications. An accurate magnetically-coupled-resonator (MCR) analysis and evaluation method is proposed to capture the MCR characteristics and optimize PA gain and bandwidth. A low-loss-matching-resonator (LLMR) technology is developed to enhance power gain and efficiency. The PA achieves a peak gain of 21.1dB at 67GHz with a 3dB bandwidth (BW_-3dB) of 10GHz. At 67GHz, the measured saturated output power (P_sat), the output 1dB compression point (OP_1dB) and the peak PAE are 13.9dBm, 9.7dBm and 11.8%, respectively.