ESD protection design for differential low-noise amplifier with cross-coupled SCR

Abstract

A new electrostatic discharge (ESD) protection scheme for differential low-noise amplifier (LNA) was proposed in this paper. The new ESD protection scheme, which evolved from the conventional double-diode ESD protection scheme without adding any extra device, was realized with cross-coupled silicon-controlled rectifier (SCR). With the new ESD protection scheme, the pin-to-pin ESD robustness can be improved, which was the most critical ESD-test pin combination for differential input pads. Experimental results had shown that differential LNA with cross-coupled-SCR ESD protection scheme can achieve excellent ESD robustness and good RF performances.