A K-band UWB receiver front-end with passive mixer in 90 nm CMOS

This paper presents a K-band UWB RF receiver front-end implemented in 90 nm CMOS technology. The receiver is based on a quadrature direct down-conversion architecture for non-coherent pulse detection. The receiver prototype chip includes LNA, quadrature passive mixers, quadrature voltage controlled oscillator and buffers. To ensure wideband operation throughout the receiver chain, inter-stage matching is necessary. By utilizing the impedance frequency up-conversion of the passive mixers, an on-chip series inductor provide a very wideband matching for the LNA output. Measurements of the receiver show a -3 dB bandwidth of 5.4 GHz with a voltage conversion gain of 10 dB and a measured power consumption of 38 mW.