Analysis of Flicker Noise in a Multimode Radio for Cellular and Connectivity Applications

This paper describes work on a multi-mode radio receiver intended to facilitate the convergence of cellular and connectivity applications. The radio has been designed to be capable of a large number of radio modes including GSM, EDGE, UMTS and 802.11 standards. The radio consists of an RF CMOS front-end, a sigma-delta ADC and CMOS decimation circuits. A system simulator has been implemented, in order to verify the radio receiver performance in all modes. The simulation of flicker (1/f) noise is particularly important for RF CMOS front-ends. This paper analyses the effect of Flicker noise on the radio receiver, and presents the results of simulations of radio performance obtained.