A Low-Voltage CMOS Buffer for RF Applications Based on a Fully-Differential Voltage-Combiner

Part 20: Electronics: RF ApplicationsInternational audienceThis paper presents a new CMOS buffer circuit topology for radio-frequency (RF) applications based on a fully-differential voltage-combiner circuit, capable of operating at low-voltage. The proposed circuit uses a combination of common-source (CS) and common-drain (CD) devices. The simulation results show good levels of linearity and bandwidth. To improve total harmonic distortion (THD) a source degeneration technique is used. The proposed circuit has been designed in a 130nm logic CMOS technology and it achieves a simulated gain of 1.54 dB, a bandwidth of 1.14 GHz for a total power dissipation of 13.34 mW, when driving an RF active probe (with 0.8 pF in parallel with 200 kΩ)