A Ka-band HEMT MMIC 1 watt power amplifier

Abstract

A 34-36-GHz, 1-W, 9-dB-gain monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) power amplifier which utilizes 0.15- mu m pseudomorphic InGaAs-GaAs high-electron-mobility transistor (HEMT) process technology is discussed. Power amplifier sites across the wafer were fully characterized with an on-wafer pulsed large-signal S-parameter test set. Test results from these amplifier chips showed output powers >30 dBm, with >9-dB gain, and power-added efficiencies >20%. Overall chip size is 4.8 mm*2.3 mm. A two-stage power amplifier module using one chip to drive three chips has been developed. The resulting amplifier module has achieved 3-W output power and 17-dB gain from 34-36 GHz.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">&gt;</ETX>