Enabling Almost Digital, Power Efficient, Wireless Transmitters

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Enabling Almost Digital, Power Efficient, Wireless TransmittersThe objective of the research is to develop efficient, precise, and highly re-configurable wireless communication transmitter integrated circuits. The proposed approach replaces the most important component of a transmitter, namely the analog power amplifier (PA), with a new power digital-to-analog converter (PDAC) to generate high power, wide bandwidth modulated radio frequency signals with minimal power consumption. Unlike the traditional analog PA, the PDAC uses digital signal processing principles and digital logic to improve performance; it is therefore reliable, re-configurable, and appropriate for integration in deep sub-micron fabrication processes. A prototype transmitter integrated circuit suitable for broadband wireless and/or cel-lular communications will be designed, had fabricated, and tested as a proof of concept.The intellectual merit is that it presents a promising, radically different approach to im-prove wireless transmitter performance and reliability. It envisages a solution that treats digital-to-analog converter and power amplifier research together, and not in isolation; treating them in isolation has inexorably led to optimized solutions that are not re-configurable.The broader impacts of the project are two fold. First, it addresses the fundamental problem of building agile, efficient wireless radios that are crucial to the growth of communica-tion systems in particular and the electronics industry in general. Second, it will encourage stu-dents from underrepresented groups to take up advanced engineering careers by providing graduate students and summer interns recruited specifically from such groups to work on the pro-ject under close supervision of the PI.