Investigation of load modulated inverse Class-F power amplifier with extended conduction angle

Abstract

A novel design space of load modulated (LM) inverse Class‐F power amplifiers (PAs) with extended conduction angle is proposed. The effects of the driven level factor β and the biasing operation factor ρ on the third‐harmonic generation are discussed. The harmonic generation mechanism shows that the knee voltage effects are the source of third‐harmonics for LM inverse Class‐F PAs. The definition of the inverse Class‐F mode is consistently valid under the circumstance of load modulation in a limited output power back‐off (OPBO) range. Meanwhile, the conduction angle θ0 can be extended from π/2 to a limited value (<110°) to keep the standard waveforms of inverse Class‐F mode and maintain high efficiency. After introducing the “continuous concept” and the second harmonic manipulation method, the mathematical design space of inverse Class‐F PAs with extended conduction angle is derived. Calculation shows that the purely conductive load modulation can enable high back‐off efficiency operation for LM inverse Class‐F PAs. As proof of concept, a demonstrator amplifier is fabricated and measured. The experimental results show that the power added efficiency (PAE) with optimum Vctrl is improved by 5% over an OPBO range of 6 dB compared with the same PA with fixed Vctrl.

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