A 1-2 GHz low phase-noise wide-band LC-VCO with active inductor based noise filter

A voltage controlled LC-oscillator (LC-VCO) has been designed in a 130 nm CMOS technology to cover a wide range of frequencies (1.0-2.0 GHz). With a 66 percent tuning range and a maximum KVCO of 240 MHz/V, it consumes 2.1 mW of power from a 1.2 V supply. An active inductor based noise-filter improves the phase-noise performance of the oscillator without much increase in the area. The oscillator phase-noise is -120 dBc/Hz at an offset of 1 MHz at a carrier frequency of 2 GHz. It can be used for cognitive radio and other wide-band and multi-band RF applications.