A wideband high isolation CMOS T/R switch for X-band phased array radar systems

This paper presents an SPDT switch which is designed to operate at 8-12 GHz frequency range (X-Band), as a sub module of the front end circuit of a phased array radar. The switch distinguishes itself from its counterparts with its larger frequency range and higher isolation that is uniformly distributed over its bandwidth. It is fabricated using 0.25μm SiGe BiCMOS technology of IHP Microelectronics (Germany). As a new technique, shunt inductors are placed next to shunt transistors in order to improve trade-off between insertion loss and isolation. It has isolation higher than 30 dB in entire band, input referred 1dB compression point is 27.6 dBm, insertion loss is between 2.7-4.1 dB, input and output referred return losses are better than 11 dB in the frequency range of 8-12 GHz.