A 100–140 GHz SiGe-BiCMOS sub-harmonic down-converter mixer

This paper demonstrates a wideband, subharmonic down converting mixer using a commercial 130-nm SiGe-BiCMOS technology. The mixer adopts a frequency doubling LO-stage, a differential switched-transconductance RF-stage, on-chip LO and RF baluns, and two emitter-follower buffer-stages. The measured results exhibit a maximum conversion gain up to 2.6 dB over the frequency range of 100 to 140 GHz with a LO power of 5 dBm. The mixer achieves an input referred 1-dB compression point of −7.2 dBm, with a DC power of 46.3 mW, including 26.7 mW for buffer-stages. It demonstrates also up to 12 GHz 3-dB IF bandwidth, which to the authors' best knowledge, is the highest obtained among active sub-harmonic mixers operating above 100 GHz. The chip occupies 0.4 mm2, including pads.