A 0.49 mm2 CMOS Low-Power TVCO Achieving FoM of 190.36 dBc/Hz for 5G New Radio Application

Abstract

This paper describes the implementation of low-power, low-phase-noise (PN), and robust startup tailless class-C voltage-controlled oscillator (TVCO) for 5G new radio (NR) technology. It features dual gate voltage control source biasing to generate fast startup and differential signal amplitude balancing, thus eliminating the requirement of the conventional tail current source, which introduces more parasitic capacitance that affects the oscillation frequency, phase noise, and power consumption. The TVCO is fabricated in 180 nm complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) technology, oscillating at 2.59 GHz 5G NR carrier frequency with an output voltage swing of 1.7 V and low-phase-noise of -122 dBc/Hz at 1 MHz offset with supply voltage headroom of 0.7 V. Without additional features added, the TVCO consumes very low-power and a small die area of 0.98 mW and 0.49 mm², respectively. The achieved figure of merit (FoM) is 190.36 dBc/Hz.