A 5-GHz fully integrated low-power wide-tuning-range CMOS LC VCO

[[abstract]]A 5-GHz-band monolithic LC differential voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) with low-power consumption and wide-tuning-range was designed and implemented using a standard 0.18-mu m CMOS technology. Low-power consumption is achieved by maximizing the equivalent parallel resistance of the LC tank, while wide-tuning-range is achieved by minimizing the summed parasitic capacitance of the differential inductor and the cross-coupled PMOS transistors pair. The LC VCO achieves a wide-tuning-range of 14.1% (from 4.95 to 5.7 GHz) with a low-power dissipation of 1.5 mW. The measured phase noise is -111.1 dBc/Hz at 1-MHz offset. The corresponding figure-of-merit (FOM') of the VCO is -166.8 dBc/Hz, which is comparable with, or even better than, those of the reported state-of-the-art CMOS LC VCOs in 5-GHz-band. The chip area is only 630 x 730 mu m(2) excluding the test pads. (C) 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.[[note]]SC