A low noise amplifier for human body communication RF front-end design

Abstract

A Low Noise Amplifier (LNA) for Human Body Communication (HBC) RF front-end was presented in this paper. The circuit was designed with SMIC 0.18um process and simulated with Cadence Spectre. HBC characteristics, such as channel pass band and attenuation were investigated prior to the design. An active noise cancellation technique was employed to achieve low noise figure. And resistor feedback technique was introduced to meet the design specifications. Post-annotated simulations showed that the LNA with an active area of 60μm×50μm worked as intended. Within the frequency band from 100 KHz to 100MHz, the minimum noise figure was 1.82 dB and the S21 value was 19.5 dB, respectively.