A new preamplifier ASIC has been designed and built to improve performance of the VTPC (Vertex Time Projection Chamber) at Fermilab's Colliding Detector Facility. Design of the semicustom IC was completed using a Tektronix QuickChip 2s bipolar linear army. The ASK has 6 channels on a chip and provides lower noise, higher gain. lower power, aad lower mass packaging than the device which it replaces. Actual performance of the preamplifier was found to match very closely the simulated pmformaa IX. To reduce the mass of the complete circuit board, bare IC dice were mounted directly on a G-10 substrate using COB (chip on board) techniques. The preamplifier and packaging should be applicable to numerous other systems.
A b s t r a c tWe are developing an innovative microwave-integrated-circuits class at Caltech that uses personal computers to design and analyze microstrip circuits, and to make the artwork and measurements. We have written an interactive microwave computer-aided-design program, P u f , that is quite fast at laying out and analyzing microstrip circuits. The students fabricate a different circuit each week and test them on a network analyzer controlled by a personal computer. The fabrication and measurement process is streamlined so that it all can be done in a single three-hour lab period.
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