Highly Efficient CMOS Transmitter for Emerging Broadband Wireless Communication Systems

适用于新兴宽带无线通信系统的高效 CMOS 发射器

• 批准号: 2123625
• 负责人: Jose Silva-Martinez
• 金额: $ 37.5万
• 依托单位: Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2021-09-01 至 2024-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2123625&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Highly; Efficient; CMOS; Transmitter; Emerging

Recent developments in mobile computing and wireless internet have led to an increasing demand for portable computers and smart phones equipped with wireless local area networks operating with multi-standard capabilities. More standards and applications will be incorporated in the near future local area wireless networks due to the advances of the semiconductors technology that allows more devices on a single complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) chip. The wireless connectivity has expanded far beyond smartphones and person-to-person communications to now encompass unexpected device-to-device communication systems. The trend towards faster and more efficient communication systems demand an optimal use of the available spectrum by employing more advanced coding schemes that increases the number of transmitted bits per symbol, and that results in more effective transmission of information per available bandwidth. But, these systems demand stringent transmitter/receiver (TX/RX) specifications. The advanced coding schemes assign more bits per transmit symbol, then the voltage difference between symbols reduces making the communication scheme more sensitive to the background noise, then it demands superior signal power to noise power ratio. The signal power is usually bounded to allow other users to share the available spectrum; for handheld devices it is a must to optimize the use of power to extend battery’s recharging time. The major challenge is the lack of transistor’s linearity to satisfy the requirements of advanced standards. The device non-linearities generate non-linear replicas of the transmitted and received signals with multiple intermodulation products falling in the signal band which degrade the quality of the original signal. This research program will develop innovative digital CMOS based global calibration schemes for the transmitter that addresses these issues.The predicted market for connected smart devices will be over 75 billion devices by 2025. However, the emerging multimedia applications demand more bandwidth and better system performance due to the use of spectral efficient modulation schemes with large peak-to-average ratios. The ultra-broadband transceivers are less tolerant to transmit errors and demand stringent transceiver linearity, flat gain in the entire signal bandwidth and linear phase response. In addition, the power amplifier (PA) is responsible for most of the power consumption in hand-held devices; improving the power efficiency and performance of the transmitter is critical for the advance of mobile communication systems. The transmitter optimization is a complex task that cannot be achieved by using conventional calibration methodologies. Most of the transmitter errors are non-linear and signal dependent, then the evaluation of these errors is a difficult task. The typical compensation methodologies are complex and expensive in terms of power consumption and digital resources, and it is very difficult to use them in broadband applications. Affective cost is another important constraint. Currently, over 85% of the existing transmitters are fabricated in non-CMOS technologies, while the control and signal processing is implemented in CMOS technologies. Full CMOS transceivers offer a system solution on chip will have significant impact on the efficiency, reliability, and production cost of the transceivers. The proposed CMOS TX architecture leverages on an agile envelope tracking system based on an innovative current on demand current-steering digital-to-analog converter that enhances the tracking capabilities and power efficiency of the power management system. Also, the proposed broadband low-power digital linearization technique accounts for PA non-linearities, bandwidth and phase TX limitations, as well as memory effects. The proposed TX architecture will achieve an error vector magnitude under -40dB and power added efficiency over 30% when handling 400MHz signal bandwidth.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

移动计算和无线互联网的最新发展导致对配备具有多标准功能的无线局域网的便携式计算机和智能手机的需求不断增长。由于半导体技术的进步，允许在单个互补金属氧化物半导体 (CMOS) 芯片上安装更多设备，因此在不久的将来，局域网无线网络中将纳入更多标准和应用。无线连接已经远远超出了智能手机和人对人通信的范围，现在涵盖了意想不到的设备对设备通信系统。更快、更高效的通信系统的趋势要求通过采用更先进的编码方案来优化可用频谱的使用，从而增加每个符号传输的位数，并导致每个可用带宽更有效地传输信息。但是，这些系统需要严格的发射器/接收器 (TX/RX) 规范。先进的编码方案为每个传输符号分配更多的比特，然后符号之间的电压差减小，使得通信方案对背景噪声更加敏感，因此需要优异的信号功率与噪声功率比。信号功率通常受到限制，以允许其他用户共享可用频谱；对于手持设备，必须优化电源的使用以延长电池的充电时间。主要挑战是晶体管的线性度不足以满足先进标准的要求。该器件的非线性特性会生成发射和接收信号的非线性副本，其中多个互调产物落在信号频带内，从而降低了原始信号的质量。该研究计划将为发射机开发创新的数字 CMOS 全局校准方案，以解决这些问题。预计到 2025 年，联网智能设备的市场将超过 750 亿台。然而，由于使用具有较大峰均比的频谱高效调制方案，新兴多媒体应用需要更多带宽和更好的系统性能。超宽带收发器对传输错误的容忍度较低，并且需要严格的收发器线性度、整个信号带宽的平坦增益以及线性相位响应。此外，功率放大器 (PA) 是手持设备中大部分功耗的来源；提高发射机的功率效率和性能对于移动通信系统的进步至关重要。发射机优化是一项复杂的任务，无法通过使用传统的校准方法来实现。大多数发射机误差是非线性的并且与信号相关，因此评估这些误差是一项艰巨的任务。典型的补偿方法复杂且在功耗和数字资源方面昂贵，并且很难在宽带应用中使用它们。情感成本是另一个重要的制约因素。目前，超过 85% 的现有发送器采用非 CMOS 技术制造，而控制和信号处理则采用 CMOS 技术实现。全 CMOS 收发器提供的片上系统解决方案将对收发器的效率、可靠性和生产成本产生重大影响。所提出的 CMOS TX 架构利用敏捷包络跟踪系统，该系统基于创新的电流按需电流引导数模转换器，可增强电源管理系统的跟踪能力和电源效率。此外，所提出的宽带低功耗数字线性化技术解决了 PA 非线性、带宽和相位 TX 限制以及记忆效应。所提议的 TX 架构在处理 400MHz 信号带宽时将实现低于 -40dB 的误差矢量幅度，并且功率附加效率超过 30%。该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优点和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

项目成果

Design of Supply Regulators for High-Efficiency RF Transmitters

高效射频发射器电源稳压器的设计

• 发表时间: 2022
• 期刊: IEEE RFIC virtual journal
• 作者: Jose Silva-Martinez;Bertan Bakkaloglu;Sayfe Kiaei;Tanwei Yan;Zhiyong Zhang;Parisa Mahmoudidaryan
• 通讯作者: Parisa Mahmoudidaryan