110–135 GHz SiGe BiCMOS Frequency Quadrupler Based on a Single Gilbert Cell

This paper proposes a compact and efficient frequency quadrupler based on a single Gilbert cell which converts 30 GHz input frequency directly into 120 GHz. It consists of a spiral Marchand edge coupled input balun, a Gilbert cell based quadrupler core and an output buffer. The Gilbert cell core, which is conventionally utilized as a doubler, is utilized here as a quadrupler to generate strong fourth harmonic by maximizing the nonlinearity of the transconductance stage in order to mix the third harmonic with the fundamental component in the switching quad. The usage of single stage multiplication enables to achieve high power efficiency and wide bandwidth. The circuit implemented in 0.13μm SiGe BiCMOS achieves an output power of 2.7 dBm at 120 GHz with a 3-dB bandwidth of 25 GHz and a power efficiency of 4.1 %. Spurious rejection is better than 30 dBc at the output frequency of 120 GHz. The circuit occupies a silicon area of 0.42 mm2.