A D-Band Front-End T/R MMIC in a $70-\text{nm}$ GaN HEMT Technology

This paper demonstrates a D-band transmit/receive (T/R) front-end MMIC based on a <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$70-\text{nm}$</tex> GaN-on-SiC HEMT technology. It features a small chip size of only <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$3 ~\text{mm}^{2}$</tex>. Hence, it allows seamless integration into phased array front-end modules. At a <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$3-\text{dB}$</tex> bandwidth of 131 to 144 GHz, it delivers a peak saturated output power (<tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$P_{\text {sat }}$</tex>) of 20 dBm, an output-referred <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$1-\text{dB}$</tex> compression point (<tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$O P_{1-\text{dB}}$</tex>) of 16.5 dBm, a peak power added efficiency (<tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$P A E_{\text {max }}$</tex>) of 7.3 % and a minimum noise figure <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$(N F)$</tex> of 7 dB. To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first GaN-based T/R front-end MMIC operating at D-band.