Wideband Two-Way Hybrid Doherty Outphasing Power Amplifier

Abstract

A new type of wideband dual-input hybrid Doherty outphasing power amplifier (HDO-PA) is developed in which the load-modulation scheme continuously converts as the frequency increase, from the previously reported HDO-PA mode with maximum flat efficiency response versus power to the conventional Doherty PA mode. For a symmetric HDO-PA implementation, this corresponds to the peak-to-backoff fundamental voltage ratio of the auxiliary amplifier linearly varying from 9/7 to 2 with frequency. A transmission-line-based wideband HDO-PA prototype is first established at the current-source reference planes to cover the frequency band from 1.4-GHz to 2.5-GHz. The wideband HDO-PA is implemented next at the package reference planes by synthesizing the wideband combiner circuit required to sustain the intrinsic load-modulation behavior across the entire frequency bandwidth. A 1.4-GHz to 2.5-GHz wideband HDO-PA is fabricated and characterized using both continuous-wave and modulated signals. The 6-dB backoff efficiency varies from 60% to 44% and the maximum power from 44.8 dBm to 42.9 dBm as the frequency increases. When the PA is excited with a 20 MHz bandwidth long-term evolution signal at 1.7 GHz with 6.5 dB peak-to-average-power ratio (PAPR), the PA achieves an average drain efficiency of 50.3% with -32.0 dBc adjacent-channel-power leakage ratio (ACLR) and an average drain efficiency of 47.8% with -54.0 dBc ACLR after digital predistortion linearization.