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Micromachines
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Advances in MMICs
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Advances in MMICs

A special issue of Micromachines (ISSN 2072-666X).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (28 February 2015) | Viewed by 39893

Special Issue Editor

Dr. Geok Ing Ng

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Division of Microelectronics, School of Electrical & Electronic Engineering, College of Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 639798, Singapore
Interests: compound semiconductor based high frequency devices; gallium nitride on silicon HEMTs; MMIC
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Monolithic Microwave Integrated Circuits (MMICs) have come a long way since its first inception in 1968. The effort to develop MMIC technology was originally motivated by the needs to develop miniature size microwave circuits primarily for defense applications. The MIMIC program by Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) was one of the main driving forces to push for the state-of-the-art MMIC technologies. The program was an overwhelming success which gave rise to MMICs that are being deployed in many defense electronic systems. With the success of this breakthrough technology, MMICs were subsequently adopted by commercial foundries worldwide for many of today’s commercial applications.

Since the first realization of MMIC using GaAs MESFET technology, MMIC performance has made tremendous progress with the advancement in material and device technologies. For examples, GaAs-based and InP-based HEMTs and HBTs, and the more recent GaN-based HEMTs. Si-based MMICs, in particular, have also made remarkable advancement over the years with unprecedented high operating frequencies. Besides active devices, passive components and design techniques have also made significant progress, further contributing to the enhancement of device performance, improvement of form factor and cost reduction of modern day MMICs.

This special issue will invite manuscripts on MMIC-related papers in areas including but not limited to active and passive components for MMIC applications, MMIC design, packaging, testing and reliability. The papers may be of original contributions or reviews. We aim for this special issue to refresh our memories on the past development of MMICs, their recent developments and also provide us with a glimpse of the future trend in this technology.

Dr. Geok Ing Ng
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Micromachines is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • MMIC
  • microwave/millimeter-wave
  • compound semiconductors
  • MESFET; HEMT; HBT
  • transistors; diodes
  • active components; passive components
  • packaging
  • reliability

Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

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1335 KiB  
Article
Design of 340 GHz 2× and 4× Sub-Harmonic Mixers Using Schottky Barrier Diodes in Silicon-Based Technology
by Chao Liu, Qiang Li, Yihu Li, Xiang Li, Haitao Liu and Yong-Zhong Xiong
Micromachines 2015, 6(5), 592-599; https://doi.org/10.3390/mi6050592 - 12 May 2015
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 6371
Abstract
This paper presents the design of terahertz 2× and 4× sub-harmonic down-mixers using Schottky Barrier Diodes fabricated in standard 0.13 μm SiGe BiCMOS technology. The 340 GHz sub-harmonic mixers (SHMs) are designed based on anti-parallel-diode-pairs (APDPs). With the 2nd and 4th harmonic, local [...] Read more.
This paper presents the design of terahertz 2× and 4× sub-harmonic down-mixers using Schottky Barrier Diodes fabricated in standard 0.13 μm SiGe BiCMOS technology. The 340 GHz sub-harmonic mixers (SHMs) are designed based on anti-parallel-diode-pairs (APDPs). With the 2nd and 4th harmonic, local oscillator (LO) frequencies of 170 GHz and 85 GHz are used to pump the two 340 GHz SHMs. With LO power of 7 dBm, the 2× SHM exhibits a conversion loss of 34.5–37 dB in the lower band (320–340 GHz) and 35.5–41 dB in the upper band (340–360 GHz); with LO power of 9 dBm, the 4× SHM exhibits a conversion loss of 39–43 dB in the lower band (320–340 GHz) and 40–48 dB in the upper band (340–360 GHz). The measured input 1-dB conversion gain compression point for the 2× and 4× SHMs are −8 dBm and −10 dBm at 325 GHz, respectively. The simulated LO-IF (intermediate frequency) isolation of the 2× SHM is 21.5 dB, and the measured LO-IF isolation of the 4× SHM is 32 dB. The chip areas of the 2× and 4× SHMs are 330 μm × 580 μm and 550 μm × 610 μm, respectively, including the testing pads. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in MMICs)
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351 KiB  
Article
A Compact W-Band Reflection-Type Phase Shifter with Extremely Low Insertion Loss Variation Using 0.13 µm CMOS Technology
by Xiao-Dong Deng, Yihu Li, Wen Wu and Yong-Zhong Xiong
Micromachines 2015, 6(3), 390-395; https://doi.org/10.3390/mi6030390 - 23 Mar 2015
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 6702
Abstract
This paper presents a reflection-type phase shifter (RTPS) at W-band in a 0.13 µm complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) process. The RTPS is composed of a 90° hybrid coupler and two identical reflection loads. Lumped-distributed element transmission line is introduced in the 90° [...] Read more.
This paper presents a reflection-type phase shifter (RTPS) at W-band in a 0.13 µm complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) process. The RTPS is composed of a 90° hybrid coupler and two identical reflection loads. Lumped-distributed element transmission line is introduced in the 90° hybrid coupler to reduce the chip size. Series inductor-capacitor (LC) resonators are used as the reflective loads and parallel inductors are deployed to reduce insertion loss variation. By cascading two-stage RTPS, 90° phase shifting range and 10.5 dB insertion loss with 1 dB variations from 80 GHz to 90 GHz are achieved. An impressive 0.1 dB variation is obtained at 86 GHz. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in MMICs)
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867 KiB  
Article
Evolution of Monolithic Technology for Wireless Communications: GaN MMIC Power Amplifiers For Microwave Radios
by Vittorio Camarchia, Marco Pirola and Roberto Quaglia
Micromachines 2014, 5(3), 711-721; https://doi.org/10.3390/mi5030711 - 12 Sep 2014
Viewed by 8360
Abstract
This paper presents the progress of monolithic technology for microwaveapplication, focusing on gallium nitride technology advances in the realization of integratedpower amplifiers. Three design examples, developed for microwave backhaul radios, areshown. The first design is a 7 GHz Doherty developed with a research [...] Read more.
This paper presents the progress of monolithic technology for microwaveapplication, focusing on gallium nitride technology advances in the realization of integratedpower amplifiers. Three design examples, developed for microwave backhaul radios, areshown. The first design is a 7 GHz Doherty developed with a research foundry, while thesecond and the third are a 7 GHz Doherty and a 7–15 GHz dual-band combined poweramplifiers, both based on a commercial foundry process. The employed architectures, themain design steps and the pros and cons of using gallium nitride technology are highlighted.The measured performance demonstrates the potentialities of the employed technology, andthe progress in the accuracy, reliability and performance of the process. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in MMICs)
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2626 KiB  
Article
Reliability Investigation of GaN HEMTs for MMICs Applications
by Alessandro Chini, Gaudenzio Meneghesso, Alessio Pantellini, Claudio Lanzieri and Enrico Zanoni
Micromachines 2014, 5(3), 570-582; https://doi.org/10.3390/mi5030570 - 22 Aug 2014
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 6517
Abstract
Results obtained during the evaluation of radio frequency (RF) reliability carried out on several devices fabricated with different epi-structure and field-plate geometries will be presented and discussed. Devices without a field-plate structure experienced a more severe degradation when compared to their counterparts while [...] Read more.
Results obtained during the evaluation of radio frequency (RF) reliability carried out on several devices fabricated with different epi-structure and field-plate geometries will be presented and discussed. Devices without a field-plate structure experienced a more severe degradation when compared to their counterparts while no significant correlation has been observed with respect of the different epi-structure tested. RF stress induced two main changes in the device electrical characteristics, i.e., an increase in drain current dispersion and a reduction in gate-leakage currents. Both of these phenomena can be explained by assuming a density increase of an acceptor trap located beneath the gate contact and in the device barrier layer. Numerical simulations carried out with the aim of supporting the proposed mechanism will also be presented. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in MMICs)
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Review

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6178 KiB  
Review
Advances in Silicon Based Millimeter-Wave Monolithic Integrated Circuits
by Han-Chih Yeh, Ching-Chau Chiong, Ming-Tang Chen and Huei Wang
Micromachines 2014, 5(4), 1373-1415; https://doi.org/10.3390/mi5041373 - 10 Dec 2014
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 11033
Abstract
In this paper, the advances of the silicon-based millimeter-wave (MMW) monolithic integrated circuits (MMICs) are reported. The silicon-based technologies for MMW MMICs are briefly introduced. In addition, the current status of the MMW MMICs is surveyed and novel circuit topologies are summarized. Some [...] Read more.
In this paper, the advances of the silicon-based millimeter-wave (MMW) monolithic integrated circuits (MMICs) are reported. The silicon-based technologies for MMW MMICs are briefly introduced. In addition, the current status of the MMW MMICs is surveyed and novel circuit topologies are summarized. Some representative MMW MMICs are illustrated as design examples in the categories of their functions in a MMW system. Finally, there is a conclusion and description of the future trend of the development of the MMW ICs. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in MMICs)
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