Compact 110-170 GHz amplifier in 50 nm mHEMT technology with 25 dB gain

A broadband high-gain amplifier MMIC (monolithic microwave integrated circuit) operating over the full D-band from 110-170 GHz is presented. A meandered coplanar waveguide (CPW) design is used to shrink the size of the circuit block to 0.9 x 0.7 mm while accommodating four amplification stages. The gain of the amplifier exceeds 25 dB nearly over the full band and peaks to 30 dB at the upper band edge. A saturated output power Psat of 5 dBm and a noise figure NF of 6 dB were measured at 140 GHz. Design details of lossy matching for stabilization and reduction of gain peaking are discussed by an additional design variation. Both amplifiers were manufactured on the 50 nm metamorphic high electron mobility transistor (mHEMT) process of Fraunhofer IAF.