A 3 kHz flicker noise corner, odd-phase active mixer for direct conversion receivers

Abstract

We present a new type of flicker noise, mismatch up-converting active mixer with an odd number of cascode switching pairs that relax the local oscillator (LO) switching speed, which reduces the flicker noise from indirect mechanisms. The high-crossing master LO drivers improve the IIP3 at a 1.2 V supply voltage, and a frequency-reconfigurable LO generator is also presented for multiband operations. The measured flicker noise corner is <; 4 kHz with 13 dBm IIP3 and > 60 dBm IIP2 at the 1.8 GHz effective LO frequency.