A subharmonic self-oscillating mixer with integrated antenna for 60-GHz wireless applications

A balanced integrated-antenna self-oscillating mixer at 60 GHz is presented in this paper. The modal radiation characteristics of a dual-feed planar quasi-Yagi antenna are used to achieve RF-local oscillator (RF-LO) isolation between closely spaced frequencies. The balanced mixer is symmetric, inherently broad band, and does not need an RF balun. Pseudomorphic high electron-mobility transistors are used in a 30-GHz push-pull circuit to generate the second harmonic and a 30-GHz dielectric resonator was used to stabilize the fundamental oscillation frequency. This allows the possibility of building a balanced low-cost self-contained antenna integrated receiver with low LO leakage for short-range narrow-band communication. Phase locking can be done with half of the RF frequency. The circuit exhibits a conversion loss less than 15 dB from 60 to 61.5 GHz, radiation leakage of -26 dBm at 60 GHz, and IF phase noise of -95 dBc/Hz at 100-kHz offset.

I. Introduction

IN THIS paper, a novel integrated-antenna receiver front-end is introduced. The RF frequency is 60 GHz, allowing high data transmission rates. This high-frequency design results in a compact planar design, which is highly desired in many developing commercial applications. One possible application is real-time transmission of digital video signals. The receiver incorporates several novel features. First, the receiver is directly integrated with a planar quasi-Yagi antenna, which provides the basis for a simple balanced design. Next, a second harmonic self-oscillating mixer (SOM) is used, with a number of benefits, including reduced cost through lowered component count, the ability to use devices with a lower , and the commercial availability of dielectric resonators (DRs) at 30 GHz.