A new method for measuring am compression and AM-to-PM conversion of microwave amplifiers

The measurement of the nonlinearity characteristics is usually cumbersome. In this paper a simple method is presented for the measurement of some nonlinearity characteristics, i.e. for the AM compression and AM-to-PM conversion. These methods offer easy measurement processes that are widely applicable and do not need special instrumentation. They have another important advantage: the dynamic behavior of the AM compression and AM-to-PM conversion characteristics can also be obtained in a simple way. Using these measurement methods the AM compression and AM-to-PM conversion characteristics of a microwave amplifier have been tested.