InP DHBT D-Band Stacked Power Amplifier

Abstract

In this paper, a D-band stacked power amplifier in a 0.7-×m InP DHBT technology is reported. The power amplifier is implemented using a novel finite-ground elevated coplanar waveguide (FG-ECPW) interconnect environment leading to low-loss power combination. A miniaturized Wilkinson power combiner demonstrates a low loss of ~0.5 dB when measured in a back-to-back configuration. A fabricated two-stage two-way combined triple stacked power amplifier demonstrates a small-signal gain of 14.9 dB at 118 GHz and a - 3 dB bandwidth from 111.2 GHz to 130.6 GHz. The amplifier reaches a peak output power of 17 dBm at 120 GHz. The corresponding large-signal power gain is 9 dB and the PAE is 7.2%