Miniaturized 0.3-6 GHZ LTCC Six-Port Receiver for Software Defined Radio

Abstract

Abstract-The six-port architecture reemerges from the search of low-cost, multi-band and multi-standard transceivers. Its inherent advantages, especially its broadband behavior, make this a structure a good candidate to implement a Software Defined Radio (SDR). However, broadband six-port network designs lead to large size circuits, especially for operating frequencies in the lower gigahertz region. New technologies must be explored in order to achieve compact size and low-cost productions for configurable radio terminals and mobile communication applications. In this paper, the Low Temperature Co-fired Ceramic (LTCC) technology is proposed for implementing a broadband six-port receiver. A compact (30 mm × 30 mm × 1.25 mm) four-octave LTCC six-port receiver is presented.Experimental demodulation results show a good performance over the frequency range from 0.3 to 6 GHz. The demodulation of up to 15.625 Msymbol/s signals, i.e., 93.6 Mbps for 64-QAM, has been satisfactorily performed, with a measured Error Vector Magnitude (EVM) value of 3.7%.

Ultra-Wideband Six-Port Network Miniaturization—Matching

“…However, the right angles of the utilized rectangular meander lines in [25] cause significant loss in the outputs' amplitudes (10 ± 2 dB) and unknown phase deviations. The best performed SP compared to the SPs reported so far is found in [26] by Morena et al Therein, a low temperature co-fired ceramic (LTCC) SP network was implemented using eight DuPont-943 substrate layers, achieving a size reduction of 63% with respect to the ordinary planar topology and a 140% FWB. A drawback of the approach in [26] is the high cost and complexity involved due to the implementation of LTCC technology.…”

“…The best performed SP compared to the SPs reported so far is found in [26] by Morena et al Therein, a low temperature co-fired ceramic (LTCC) SP network was implemented using eight DuPont-943 substrate layers, achieving a size reduction of 63% with respect to the ordinary planar topology and a 140% FWB. A drawback of the approach in [26] is the high cost and complexity involved due to the implementation of LTCC technology. Recently, in [27], a multilayered substrate integrated waveguide SP junction with stacked SP components is introduced, achieving a size reduction of 40% but with limited FBW of 0.28.…”