An Adaptive Stacked Radio-Frequency SOI Power Amplifier for Radiation-Hardened Applications

Abstract

In this paper, an adaptive stacked Radio-Frequency (RF) Power Amplifier (PA) is proposed for radiation-hardened applications. The radiation-hardened PA consists of a stacked structure where four transistors are connected in series and an adaptive radiation-hardened bias circuit for monitoring irradiation levels to adjust PA bias to achieve minimum saturated output power (Psat) degradation. The simulation results show that the PA without radiation-hardness achieves a small-signal gain of 18.5dB, a Psat of 24.9dBm with a peak power-added efficiency (PAE) of 39.6% at 10GHz. While in 300 krad(Si) radiation environment, the PA without radiation-hardness has a gain degradation of 2dB, Psat decline of 2dB, and PAE reduction by 10%. By using the adaptive radiation-hardened bias circuit, the degradation of gain is less than 0.7dB, Psat remains constant, and the reduction of PAE is 7%, when the radiation-hardened PA is irradiated up to 300 krad (Si).