An 80 GHz High Gain Double-Balanced Active Up-Conversion Mixer Using 0.18 $\mu{\rm m}$ SiGe BiCMOS Technology

This letter reports the performance of a W-band (75-110 GHz) high gain double-balanced active up-conversion mixer fabricated in a low-cost 200 GHz f
_T
and f
_max
0.18 μm SiGe BiCMOS technology. Integrated on-chip baluns are used at RF and LO ports to facilitate on-wafer characterization. The mixer achieves a measured single sideband (SSB) power conversion gain of 6.6 dB and 3.2 dB at 75 GHz and 80 GHz, respectively. The measured output-referred 1 dB compression point (OP
_1dB
) is -4.8 dBm and -7.3 dBm at 75 GHz and 80 GHz, respectively. The overall chip area is 830 μm×690 μm. The mixer draws a total of 31.5 mA from a nominal 3.3 V supply. To the best of authors' knowledge, this is the W-band active up-conversion mixer with the highest conversion gain reported among all prior published millimeter-wave silicon-based up-conversion mixers.