A 24-28 GHz Tunable LNA in 22nm FDSOI Technology

This paper presents a 26GHz tunable low noise amplifier (LNA) in 22nm FDSOI technology implemented for 5G NR at 24 GHz-28 GHz band. The LNA employs a 2-stage cascaded common source topology with inductive degeneration for input matching. For a power consumption of 13.2 mW from 800 mV voltage supply, the LNA provides a peak measured gain of 14.7 dB and a noise figure of 3.15 dB. The LNA achieves a maximum input 1-dB compression point of −12 dBm at 24 GHz with an overall area of $0.26\mathrm{~mm}^{2}$. The multi-band operation is attained through interstage and output tuning using varactors. This tunability facilitates the LNA to block out-of-band interferers that can affect the linearity and sensitivity of the radio frequency (RF) front-ends. Additionally, the tunability in matching makes the integration of LNA in RF front-ends easier. The demonstrated LNA is an essential building block of a reconfigurable front-end that will be key enabler for hardware reuse in future 6G applications.