A 0.36W 6b up to 20GS/s DAC for UWB Wave Formation

A 6b up to 20GS/s DAC is presented. The DAC is used for direct synthesis of modulated waveforms for UWB communication. The DAC has a current-steering architecture for achieving 20GS/s, a 1.8V power supply, a 4:1 MUX for reducing the line data rate, and BIST. Fabricated in a SiGe process, it consumes 0.36W and has a FOM of 0.28pJ