Improvements in dynamic and 1/f noise performances of GaAs MESFETs at cryogenic temperatures by using a monolithic process

A monolithic array of MESFETs with progressively increasing gate lengths from 1 mu m to 10 mu m and two charge preamplifiers has been designed and integrated in the same chip. Low-frequency noise and dynamic characteristics of the FETs are measured. Results show that D-FETs of the QED/A process by TriQuint present good dynamic performances and low noise at cryogenic temperatures when the gate length has an optimum value. The preamplifier shows very low power dissipation, fast response, and reasonable noise performance in spite of the use of M-FETs which do not exhibit the best noise performance for the process.<
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