A 30.9dBm, 300MHz 45-nm SOI CMOS Power Modulator for Spread-Spectrum Signal Processing at the Antenna

This paper reports a Watt-level power handling modulator using a stacked-FET switch for signal processing at the antenna. Two design approaches are compared in this paper: a resistive gate termination and an inductive gate termination. The stacked switches are implemented in 45-nm CMOS SOI. Measured performance of these stacked switches shows the benefit of an inductive termination: power handling capabilities of >30 dBm with modulation speeds of up to 300 MHz. The IIP3 is demonstrated to exceed 45 dBm.