A 1.5-to-23.5 GHz High-Power-Density Distributed PA Achieving 150.5 Gb/s Data Rate With 14.4 dBm P_avg Supporting 64/128/256-QAM in 40-nm CMOS

A distributed power amplifier (DPA) is presented for high-data-rate communication in 40-nm standard CMOS technology. Leveraging high-power-density cores, this DPA breaks the conventional compromise among output power, area and bandwidth. With the adoption of the Ruthroff-type distributed balun, balanced signals are efficiently combined across a broad bandwidth within a compact area. Furthermore, the implementation of a twisted output matching network ensures resonance with parasitic capacitance, while avoiding extra area overhead. The DPA achieves a 16.6-dB gain and delivers an output power of 19 dBm with 21.4% PAE at $P_{s a t}$, covering the bandwidth of 1.5 - 23.5 GHz from an 1.8-V supply. It reaches 150.5-Gb/s data rate with 14.4-dBm average output power in 128-QAM modulation. Besides, this study supports 256-QAM modulation at the data rate over 110 Gb/s.