A low noise 1.5GHz VCO with a 3.75% tuning range using coupled FBAR's

Abstract

We present the first IC oscillator using acoustically coupled FBAR's with a 3.75% tuning range. The tuning range is higher than previous low-power FBAR oscillators and wide enough to cover the individual ISM bands. The high Q of the resonator enables to achieve a phase noise of -144.35dBc/Hz at 1MHz offset with a carrier frequency of 1.55GHz and a power consumption of 11.7mW. The miniaturized coupled FBAR die is (500×540)μm <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> . The active area of the CMOS is (600x550)μm <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> .