A Current Re-Use Triple-Band Signal Source for Multi-Band Wireless Network-on-Chip Applications

Joseph Lee Baylon

To meet the ever-increasing demands of computational power, multi-core processor integration has risen to new heights. The wireless network-on-chip is an emerging technology which seeks to augment traditional inter-core interconnects on multi-core processors with high throughput, low power wireless interconnects. While this technology oﬀers signiﬁcant improvements in power and latency for on-chip communication networks, signiﬁcant innovation is required to realize these system level beneﬁts. To meet the speed, efficiency, and latency demands of the wireless network-on-chip architecture, highly efficient, wideband mmWave transceivers and sub-blocks must be designed. This thesis presents the design and analysis of one such transceiver sub-block. A high-performance signal source circuit suitable for the requirements of a wireless network-on-chip architecture is presented which provides multiple harmonically related outputs for non-overlapping frequency bands of a multi-band wireless network architecture. The signal source circuit consists of a 28 GHz voltage-controlled oscillator circuit which leverages transformer feedback for high output swing and low phase noise under a low voltage power supply. This design to improve the eﬀective transconductance of the active core of the oscillator and increase the available output swing of the oscillator. A second harmonic (56 GHz) signal is passively extracted from the common mode current of the fundamental oscillator. The third harmonic (84 GHz) signal is generated from these first two harmonics using a low-voltage overhead modiﬁed Gilbert-cell mixer. Transformer coupling is leveraged to reduce power consumption without sacriﬁcing signal source performance. This signal source circuit was fabricated in a 65 nm CMOS process. The fundamental oscillator demonstrates a 13% fractional tuning range, from 26.5 GHz to 30.2 GHz. The second and third harmonics exhibit identical fractional tuning range, covering 53 GHz to 60.4 GHz and 79.5 GHz to 90.6 GHz frequency ranges, respectively. A phase noise of -121 dBc/Hz at 10 MHz oﬀset frequency is measured for the fundamental oscillator. The signal source circuit consumes a total power of 7.6 mW to 8.3 mW across the frequency range. This circuit compares favorably with state-of-the-art multi-band signal source circuits from recent literature.

A Current Re-Use Triple-Band Signal Source for Multi-Band Wireless Network-on-Chip Applications

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