A Low-voltage Low-power 1JGHz CMOS LNA Design

Zhangfa Liu and Stephen Parke

Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Boise State University
1910 University Dr., Boise, ID 83725

Abstract-A
low-voltage and low-power 1.5CHz low-noise
amplifier in 0.18um CMOS technology for GPS application is
designed, this LNA has 28.7dB gain with 0.2dB noise figure from
1.OV supply voltage. Basic noise analysis and design method are
presented in this paper.

1. INTRODUCTION

HE first stage of a GPS receiver is typically a low-noise

amplifier(LNA)[1]-[3], LNA design involves tradeoffs

between many features, such as gain, noise figure, power
consumption, impedance matching, stability and linearity.
Since broadband is not necessary for GPS applications, it's
desirable to reduce power consumption by using narrowband
techniques. This paper presents a low voltage low power LNA
design at 1.5GHz.

11. SMALL SIGNAL MOSFET LNA MODEL

A small signal MOSFET LNA models are shown as Fig. 1-

2[4]-[6], the input impedance and noise factor can be written

as:

Fig. 2. Small signal MOSFET noise model

is assumed, y is the source
Where z g d > > G s
S
is the device transconductance.
admittance and

G>'?i

gm

From equation (1) we can determine the value of inductor at

source with resonance, from equation (2), it shows that
can result in lower noise factor.
increasing
gmmd Zg*

111. LNA IMPLEMENTATION

The complete LNA schematic is shown io Fig. 3. In this
schematic, L is a large inductor, MI and M2 have a width of

240um and 360um respectively, supply voltage is 1.0V and

is 3.5mA.

:Zin

I.I

'

Fig. 1. Fundamental LNA architecture

Fig. 3. Complete LNA schematic

340
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nn ,-3nnq IFFF

00

IV. SIMULATION RESULTS

Circuit was simulated using Cadence SpectreW. Fig. 4-7
show the simulation results of the Low-Noise Amplifier.

-40

-2s

f...

-20 0

-,

-12 0
i f ( dBm )

-16 0

-8 00

Fig. 7.0IP3 of the Low-Noise Amplifier at 1.54GHz

From these results we can see this LNA has high gain with
narrow band and a very good noise character at center
operating frequency.

Fig. 4. S11 and S21 of the Low-Noise Amplifier

V. CONCLUSION
A 0.2dB NF 1.5GHz low-noise amplifier has been designed
in 0.18um CMOS technology in this paper, it has 28.7dB gain
from 1.OV supply.

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[I]

Fig. 5. Noise Figure of the Low-Noise Amplifier

@0 .

-40

L L U L L u . - . - i ~

-20.0

-12.0
r f ( dBm )

-16.0

-i

-8.00

Fig. 6.1IP3 of the Low-Noise Amplifier at I .54GHz

341