RF Wireless Technology Trends

BY MURRAY SLOVICK

Given that a part of a distributor’s job is to ease the engineer’s task by providing solutions in application areas of current interest to the planning community, Mouser’s launch of a brand new RF Wireless Technology web site actually warrants the phrase “no brainer” — one thing obvious or obvious that needs very little mental effort or intelligence to grasp. After all, per those charged with trailing trade trends, RFIC market growth is predicted to chalk up a 14 July CAGR through 2015.



Block diagram navigation more speeds the search of electronic elements for style.
Spurred by the expectation of prodigious growth, suppliers developing RF product and processes are concerning as eager as a dog outside a meat market. however adding overactive development to the massive range of distinctive technologies that already fall into the umbrella of RF/microwave, reviewing recent developments within the RF house on this one page provides a alternative between creating {a few|a couple of|a range of|some|many} notations on every of an outsized number of product classes, or exploring notable trends in an exceedingly few key technology drivers. We’ve set to try and do the latter and can explore what’s happening in RF switches and power amplifiers.

RF switches square measure wont to switch an indication being routed between 2 or a lot of devices that share Associate in Nursing antenna. There square measure many sorts of RF switches, including, single-pole-double-throw (SPDT) and multiport or single-pole-multiple-throw (SPnT), and RF switches are often enforced in technologies starting from mechanical structures to semiconductor based mostly gallium-arsenide (GaAs) or CMOS FETs. Of the assorted specifications for RF switches the designer ought to examine once creating a neighborhood choice, 2 stand apart: insertion loss (a live of power loss within the signal — lowest is best as lower loss at the receive port puts less burden on the following low-noise amplifiers (LNA), and so improves receiver sensitivity), and isolation (highest is best, preventing the high power TX signal unseaworthy into the Rx path).

A relatively new style of switch is that the MEMS RF switch, that guarantees the high RF performance and low dc power consumption of mechanical device switches and also the little size and affordable options of semiconductor styles.

The advantages of RF MEMS switches begin with RF performance that's wonderful compared to PIN diode or field-effect transistor switches, including: terribly high isolation (RF MEMS switches square measure fictitious with air gaps, Associate in Nursingd thence have terribly low off-state capacitances leading to wonderful isolation); terribly low insertion loss (RF MEMS switches usually have an insertion loss of zero.1 sound unit up to one00 GHz); terribly low power consumption (electrostatic effort needs thirty to eighty V, however doesn't consume any current, resulting in terribly low power dissipation).

Disadvantages embody comparatively low speed (2 to forty µs for static MEMS switches and two hundred to three,000 µs for thermal/magnetic motivated switches) and high effort voltage (thermal/magnetic switches are often motivated mistreatment a pair of to five V, however need ten to one hundred mA of effort current).

The last output stage in each wireless system includes some variety of RF power electronic equipment (PA) to spice up the RF signal the maximum amount as doable or allowable simply before the signal is shipped out over the antenna. Power amplifiers are often fictitious employing a form of technologies as well as gallium-arsenide (GaAs), indium-gallium-phosphide, silicon-germanium, CMOS, or atomic number 31 compound (GaN).

One of the challenges in PA style is a way to reach one-dimensionality while not degrading potency. as a result of its performance during this regime, GaN High-Electron-Mobility Transistors (HEMT) technology is being thought of for several applications within which one-dimensionality and potency square measure important. the development of output power over competitory GaAs and InP technologies will increase in operation vary, cut back the antenna gain demand, or offer a mixture of the 2 edges. GaAs features a basic power density of concerning one.5 W/mm, whereas GaN features a power density starting from five to twelve W/mm. What’s a lot of, GaN has comparatively high breakdown voltages levels, up to concerning eighty V.

Even though GaN has been recognized as a compelling different to chemical element for several RF applications-- as a result of its performance edges — it's long-faced vital challenges associated with value. Those firms pushing GaN say they expect costs can fall as production volumes grow, advances in producing take hold and also the technology adapts to a lot of applications. ■

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