5.0 to 10.6 GHz 0.18 µm CMOS power amplifier with excellent group delay for UWB applications

The optimization technique to realize the minimum group delay (GD) of a 5–10.6 GHz, two stages CMOS Ultra Wideband power amplifier (UWB-PA) is presented and implemented in 0.18 µm CMOS technology. The fabricated UWB-PA has a power gain (|S
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|) of 14± 1 dB, maximum power added efficiency and an output 1-dB compression of 10 %, and 2 dBm, respectively at 6 GHz. In addition, the PA has an excellent small group delay variation of 147± 40 ps with power consumption of 20 mW and this is the smallest variations among CMOS PAs so far reported.