A 1.1nJ/b 802.15.4a-compliant fully integrated UWB transceiver in 0.13µm CMOS

TLDR

Digital reception power consumption rises sharply when RF signals are digitized into N bits at frequencies up to 20 GHz. This paper presents the first fully integrated 4‑to‑5 GHz UWB transceiver that combines full digital reception, emission, and baseband while achieving low power consumption. The transceiver uses a non‑coherent receiver that asynchronously digitizes the signal on a single bit and computes power over a 500 MHz bandwidth, and a mostly‑digital transmitter that generates pulses without high‑frequency synthesis. The design reduces the sampling frequency to 1 GHz, simplifies the 1‑bit conversion, and achieves low power consumption by pulse generation without high‑frequency synthesis, with optional digital baseband activation further improving power and integration.

Abstract

The work presented in this paper is the first integrated design that conciliates full digital reception, emission and baseband with low power consumption in the 4-to-5 GHz band. Power consumption is an important issue of digital reception when digitization of the RF signals into N bits needs frequencies up to 20 GHz. We hereafter describe a non-coherent receiver that simply digitizes the signal asynchronously on only one bit and calculates the signal power in a 500 MHz bandwidth. The sampling frequency is hence reduced to 1 GHz while the 1b conversion simplifies the design and consequently reduces the power consumption. The proposed transmitter also has mostly-digital architecture. It achieves low power consumption by generating pulses without use of high frequency synthesis and by activating the generator only during pulse emission. Low power consumption and integration level are further improved by using an integrated digital baseband that can be optionally activated.