Over-the-Air Noise Figure Characterization of mm-Wave Active Integrated Antennas Using a Reverberation Chamber

Active integrated antennas (AIAs) are used in low-noise receivers for their good noise performance compared with their nonintegrated counterparts. However, it is challenging to accurately determine one of these antennas’ most important characteristics: the noise figure (NF). To overcome the dependencies of the existing methods, we show a new method that can estimate the NF of a wireless system over-the-air (OTA), using a reverberation chamber (RC). Using the RC, we could create a consistent and repeatable measurement environment. Since this method characterizes the NF of the total system, it also includes factors such as noise matching. An extensive uncertainty analysis shows that the NF can be determined within only 0.7 dB expanded uncertainty in the frequency range from 21 to 29 GHz.