Wideband NVNA phase calibration based on multisine standards and phase alignment

This paper investigates the wideband nonlinear vector network analyzer (NVNA) phase calibration method by using a group of narrowband multisine standards and the phase alignment technique. The NVNA test-bed is obtained with a wideband multisine phase reference and a vector network analyzer (VNA), and covers a modulation bandwidth of 80 MHz on a dense spectral grid of 100 kHz. In order to calibrate the phase measurement of above NVNA architecture, a series of 63-tone multisine standards on the fine spectral grid of 100 kHz or a coarse spectral grid of 1 MHz are used, whose phase accuracy has been experimentally verified as better than ±2 degrees. To synchronize the phase calibration results derived by different mulitisine standards, overlapping tones between adjacent multisines are designed in advance, based on which the phase alignment is performed. According to the experimental results, the wideband NVNA phase calibration accuracy is ±2 degrees.