A Compact 120 GHz LNA in 22 nm FD-SOI with Back-Gate Controllable Variable-Gain

Rack, Martin [UCL] L. Nyssens Q.H. Le D.K. Huynh T. Kämpfe Raskin, Jean-Pierre [UCL] Lederer, Dimitri [UCL]

This paper describes the design and implementation of a 113.5-127 GHz D-band LNA using GlobalFoundries’ 22 nm FD-SOI technology. The proposed design achieves 6.6 dB of minimal noise-figure in-band for a peak gain of 17.5 dB at its nominal bias for a 27.5 mW power-consumption using a low supply voltage of 0.75 V, and can achieve an NF down to 6.1 dB and gain up to 19.1 dB in a high-performance state. On top of that, the LNA can be configured as a variable-gain device by making use of the unique back-gate bias node of the 22FDX® technology. In that case, a 9.7 dB gain-control is achieved over a 2 V bias range at the back-gates. The design achieves a low area of 0.039 mm² thanks to its layout based on compact transformers.