An Ultra-Wideband Low-Noise Amplifier with a New Cross-Coupling Noise-Canceling Technique for 28 nm CMOS Technology

This paper presents an ultra-wideband low-noise amplifier (LNA) with a new cross-coupling noise-canceling technique for 28 nm CMOS technology. The entire LNA contains two stages. The first stage employs inductively coupled Gm-boosted technology, while the second stage is a novel asymmetric cross-coupling noise-canceling structure (ACCNCS). Through the introduction of these two key techniques, the LNA achieves balanced performance across a relative bandwidth of 56%. Input/output/inter-stage impedance matching uses a transformer-based network with series-parallel combinations of inductors and capacitors. The LNA is designed in a 28 nm CMOS process with a chip core area of 335 × 665 µm2. The operating frequency range is 26–46 GHz. Post-layout simulation results show that the peak gain of the LNA is 12.6 dB, and the noise figure is between 2.9 and 4.2 dB across the wideband range. At a center frequency of 36 GHz with a supply voltage (VDD) of 0.9 V, the input 1 dB compression point (IP1dB) is −7.6 dBm, while the power consumption is 22 mW.