English

A mmWave Oscillator Design Utilizing High-Q Active-Mode On-Chip MEMS Resonators for Improved Fundamental Limits of Phase Noise

Signal Processing 2021-07-06 v1

Abstract

(RFT) allows very high-Q active mode resonators, promising crystal-less monolithic clock generation for mmWave systems. However, there is a strong need for design of mmWave oscillators that utilize the high-Q of active-mode RFT (AM-RFT) optimally, while handling unique challenges such as resonator's low electromechanical transduction. In this brief, we develop a theory and through design and post-layout simulations in 14 nm Global Foundry process, we show the first active oscillator with AM-RFT at 30 GHz, which improves the fundamental limits of phase noise and figure-of-merit as compared to the oscillators with conventional LC resonators. For AM-RFT with Q factor of 10K, post layout simulation results show that the proposed oscillator exhibits phase noise less than -140 dBc per Hz and figure-of-merit greater than 228 dBc per Hz at 1 MHz offset for 30 GHz center frequency, which are more than 25 dB better than the existing monolithic LC oscillators.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2107.01953,
  title  = {A mmWave Oscillator Design Utilizing High-Q Active-Mode On-Chip MEMS Resonators for Improved Fundamental Limits of Phase Noise},
  author = {Abhishek Srivastava and Baibhab Chatterjee and Udit Rawat and Yanbo He and Dana Weinstein and Shreyas Sen},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2107.01953},
  year   = {2021}
}