Efficient, high-power transmitters capable of supporting complex modulation formats are integral for high-speed data transmission over long distances, particularly in the mmwave regime. However, conventional transmitters typically face a trade-off between output power and average efficiency. This technology proposes a "digital" mmwave transmitter based on a digital-polar phased array power amplifier (PA) that simultaneously achieves high output power as well as high peak and average efficiencies. With this technology, unprecedented performance improvement can be achieved for long range high-data-rate communications in the mmwave regime using a low-cost fully integrated, silicon platform with a compact footprint.
Power amplifiers are typically most efficient at their saturation point. Direct digital-to-mmwave converters (DACs) using stacked PAs with high peak efficiency have recently been proposed as a feasible means of implementing mmwave transmitters capable of supporting complex modulations for high data-rate communications. This technology augments the stacked PAs in the mmwave DAC with switched-capacitor supply modulation to facilitate high average efficiency as well. Additionally, the stacked PAs utilize a novel supply-adaptive biasing scheme to retain stacked-PA characteristics under supply modulation. This furthers aids operation with high average efficiency. A high-speed deserializing receiver is integrated with the transmitter to facilitate high-speed operation of digital control bits. These features uniquely enable this technology to function as a mmwave power DAC-based transmitter capable of supporting high-speed complex modulations with high average efficiency.
A prototype demonstrating the feasibility of stacked mmwave power DACs for supporting modulated data with high average efficiency has been tested.
Tech Ventures Reference: IR CU14221