Bias Circuits For RF Devices PDF
Bias Circuits For RF Devices PDF
Bias Circuits For RF Devices PDF
A lot of RF schematics mention: “bias circuit not shown”; when actually one of the most critical yet
often overlooked aspects in any RF circuit design is the bias network.
The bias network determines the amplifier performance over temperature as well as RF drive.
The DC bias condition of the RF transistors is usually established independently of the RF design.
Power efficiency, stability, noise, thermal runway, and ease to use are the main concerns when selecting
a bias configuration.
A transistor amplifier must possess a DC biasing circuit for a couple of reasons.
• We would require two separate voltage supplies to furnish the desired class of bias for both the
emitter-collector and the emitter-base voltages.
• This is in fact still done in certain applications, but biasing was invented so that these separate
voltages could be obtained from but a single supply.
• Transistors are remarkably temperature sensitive, inviting a condition called thermal runaway.
Thermal runaway will rapidly destroy a bipolar transistor, as collector current quickly and
uncontrollably increases to damaging levels as the temperature rises, unless the amplifier is
temperature stabilized to nullify this effect.
In the graph above the circuit is said to be midpoint biased since the values of IC and VCE at Quiescent-
point are one-half of their maximum values.
Class A single-ended amplifiers are ordinarily used only in small-signal non-power applications.
Class A will generally require a constant current bias source to fix the operating point regardless of the
RF drive and output. The circuit will have to have some sort of feedback to keep the output current at a
fixed level, or a circuit must be created whose current is large compared to the amount of output power
required (i.e., it is quasi class A in that the operating point movement is minimal).
Simply by decreasing the Icq of the amplifier by a small amount, Class AB operation can be
reached.
But any Class AB single-ended power amplifier will create more output distortion than a Class-A type due
the output clipping of the signal’s waveform.
Class AB or B operations require some form of positive biasing - though the operating point will move
with RF drive. This will require an “open loop” circuit with some sort of compensation over ambient
conditions.
Class C will generally require a negative bias of some kind—or in most cases, the input of the
transistor is tied to ground with an inductor or resistor, which is sufficient to keep the conduction angle
correct.
The most predominant biasing schemes used to obtain both temperature stabilization and single-supply
operations are:
• base-biased emitter feedback
• voltage-divider emitter feedback
• collector-feedback
• diode feedback
• active-feedback bias
All five are found in Class A and AB operation, while Class B and C amplifiers can implement other
methods.
Usually the manufacturer supplies in their datasheets a curve showing ft versus collector current
for a bipolar transistor.
• For good gain characteristics, it is necessary to bias the transistor at a collector current that
results in maximum or near-maximum ft.
• On the other hand, for best noise characteristics, a low current is generally most desirable.
Finally, one must consider the maximum signal level expected at the input of the transistor.
• The bias point must be at a sufficiently high current (and voltage) level to prevent the input signal
from swinging the collector current out of the “linear” region of operation. It is assumed that a
transistor has been chosen having a sufficient operating current level to prevent the input signal
from driving the transistor into the so-called saturated region of operation, which would also be an
operating condition that would prevent linear operation.
• If the amplifier is to work over a range of temperature, have to design a bias network that
maintains the D.C. bias point as the operating temperature changes.
Two basic internal transistor characteristics are known to have a significant effect on the DC bias point.
These are ΔVBE and Δβ.
• The base-emitter voltage of a bipolar transistor decreases with increasing temperature at the rate
of about 2.5 mV/°C. Emitter voltage VE tends to minimize the effect because as base current
increases (as VBE decreases), collector current increases, and this causes VE to increase also.
However, as VE increases, collector current tends to decrease.
• In the same time, the transistor’s D.C. current gain β typically increases with increasing
temperature at the rate of about 0.5% per degree Celsius.
The BJT is quite often used as a Low Noise Amplifier due to its low cost. With a minimal number of
external matching networks, the BJT can quite often produce an LNA with RF performance considerably
better than an MMIC. Of equal importance is the DC performance. Although the device’s RF
performance may be quite closely controlled, the variation in device DC parameters can be quite
significant due to normal process variations.
• Important for an RF BJT is that variation in hFE from device to device (up to 3 to 1) will generally
not show up as a difference in RF performance.
• Two BJT devices with widely different hFE’s can have similar RF performance as long as the
devices are biased at the same VCE and IC. This is the primary purpose of the bias network, i.e., to
keep VCE and IC constant as the DC parameters vary from device to device.
Base-biased emitter feedback works in the following way: The base resistor (RB), the 0.7 V base-to
emitter voltage drop (VBE), and the emitter resistor (RE), are all in series;
- As the collector current (IC) increases due to a rise in the transistor’s temperature, the current through
the emitter resistor will also increase, which increases the voltage dropped across RE.
- This action lowers the voltage that would normally be dropped across the base resistor and, since the
voltage drops around a closed loop must always equal the voltage rises, this reduction in voltage across
RB decreases the base current, which then lowers the collector current.
The capacitor (CE) located across RE bypasses the RF signal around the emitter resistor to stop
excessive RF gain degeneration in this circuit.
The higher the voltage across RE (VE), the more temperature stable the amplifier, but the more power will
be wasted in RE due to VE 2/RE, as well as the decreased AC signal gain if RE is not bypassed by a low
reactance capacitor.
Standard values of VE for most HF (high frequency, or amateur band) designs are between 2 to 4 V to
stabilize ΔVBE. UHF amplifiers and higher frequencies will normally completely avoid these emitter
resistors.
For better temperature compensation the most common method is Diode Temperature
Compensation. Two diodes, D1 and D2, attached to the transistor’s heatsink or to the device itself, will
carefully track the transistor’s internal temperature changes.
Collector feedback
The circuit, employs only two resistors, along with the active device, and has very little lead inductance
due to the emitter’s direct connection to ground.
For bipolar transistors, Class-C amplifiers permit the use of three biasing techniques:
• signal
• external
• self bias
The average Class-C transistor amplifier is normally not given any bias at the base whatsoever, but in
order to lower the chances of any BJT power device instability the base should be grounded through a
low-Q choke, with a ferrite bead on the base lead’s grounded end.
These biasing techniques will still require an RF signal with high enough amplitude to overcome
the reverse (or complete lack of) bias at the Class-C input.
Stable IF Amplifier
Cascode approach is a configuration that is inherently stable. In the example below the first transistor
operates common emitter and sees as its load, the low input impedance of a common base stage.
The 10k base resistor is common for both stages, and the bias is done through a 2:1 transformer used to
get a wide-band matching.
The most common form of biasing in RF circuits is the current mirror. This basic stage is used
everywhere and it acts like a current source. It takes a current as an input and this current is usually
generated, along with all other references, by a circuit called a bandgap reference generator.
• A bandgap reference generator is a temperature-independent bias generating circuit.
• The bandgap reference generator balances the VBE dependence on temperature, to result in a
voltage or current nearly independent of temperature.
In this mirror, the bandgap reference generator produces current Ibias and forces this current through Q1.
Scaling the second transistor allows the current to be multiplied up and used to bias working transistors.
• One major drawback to this circuit is that it can inject a lot of noise at the output due primarily to
the gain of the transistor Q1 which acts like an amplifier for noise.
• A capacitor can be used to clean up the noise, and resistors degeneration can be put into the
circuit to reduce the gain of the transistor.
• With any of mirror topologies, a voltage at the collector of N.Q1 must be maintained above a
minimum level or else the transistor will go into saturation. Saturation will lead to bad matching
and nonlinearity.
With proper choice of R1 and R2, the output voltage will have zero variation with temperature,
providing in the same time at the emitters of Q1 and Q2 a voltage proportional with temperature
(thermometer output).
Generally is stated that the output impedance of the bias circuitry should be kept small, in order to
increase the linearity of the output bias stage.
However, the output impedance is typically designed to have a large resistance in order to reduce the
noise contribution from the bias circuitry, and to avoid significant loading on the RF input port.
For example, to use an inductor in the bias circuit to form low impedance near DC, and high
impedance near the RF signal band.
• It is difficult to compare different bipolar LNA’s if the biasing arrangement is not mentioned.
• Using an external bias from an external power supply can increase the IIP3 of an LNA compared
to an LNA with an on-chip bias.
Dual-bias LNA
The dual-biasing is constructed using two different bias paths. The primary biasing is a current mirror and
the secondary bias a diode bias feed circuit.
• With a small signal, the current mirror provides the bias current for the Q3 LNA.
• When the signal is increased, the Q3 base current increases and the voltage across the biasing
resistor R2 increases, reducing the base voltage.
• As the voltage drops, the current to the base of the input transistor through the diode bias-feed
(Q4) increases, compensating the base-voltage drop.
• Therefore, the LNA linearity and compression point are both improved.
• This bias circuit features the lowest source impedance of the less complex bias circuits.
Therefore, it is recommended for high power device biasing and for other demanding applications.
The main advantages of the bias source shown in the figure above:
• The circuit it provides the lowest source impedance at a relatively low cost,
• The bias voltage remains independent of variations in the power supply voltage
• Temperature compensation is easy to implement.
The diode D1 performs this function and should be in thermal contact with the heat source.
Depending on the current requirement and the pass transistor used, Q1 may have to be cooled. It has a
positive temperature coefficient to the bias voltage, but the temperature coefficient is negligible
compared to the negative coefficient of D1. This permits Q1 to be attached to the main heat sink. R1 and
D2 are only necessary if the RF amplifier is operated at a supply voltage higher than 40 V, which is the
maximum rating for the regulator.
This circuit also provides regulation against supply variations. The source impedance mainly depends on
the hFE of Q1.
Active bias design for LNA’s using lumped elements or distributed elements.
• The idea adding a diode in the circuit is to compensate for the −2.5 mV/°C of the PNP base-
emitter junction with the same factor introduced appropriately into the active bias circuit.
A good biasing scheme is shown below and uses two transistors (PNP and NPN) in a voltage-
feedback scheme from the collector to the base of Q1.
Voltage-Feedback Bias
• The voltage-feedback it maintains the collector of the RF LNA Q1 at one-half the supply voltage
plus one VBE (base-to-emitter voltage, about 0.4V).
• Transistor Q2 measures the voltage difference between the collector of Q1 and the center point of
the two resistors R1 and R2, which is amplified and fed back to the base of Q1.
• Q1’s collector voltage holds quite accurately at half the supply voltage plus one VBE because of
the gain in the feedback loop.
• Gain changes with temperature in all of the transistors are corrected for, and no adjustable
resistor is required.
• The bias circuit has to be carefully bypassed at both high and low frequencies.
FET Bias
Bias networks are what are used to put a FET at the intended quiescent operating point.
For example, you might want to operate a FET in a power amplifier at 12 volts VDS and at 50% of the
saturated drain current (IDSS/2). This is the quiescent point.
The same as in BJT case there are at least three ways to bias up a FET amplifier to get to the
intended quiescent operating point.
One option is to have separate DC power supplies for the gate and drain connections, with the
gate supply being adjustable, and ground the source. Grounding the source will provide the most gain
and efficiency from the FET. In this case generally the gate bias supply is a fixed negative power supply -
5 Volts, with an adjustable resistor-divider network being employed to supply the needed gate voltage.
Another method of biasing a FET is with an active bias network, generally designed in a feedback
configuration to maintain constant quiescent current.
Common-source FET’s can utilize a common Class-A biasing technique called source bias, a
form of self bias.
The following circuit is providing a -5V bias voltage from a positive +12V power supply.
The inverter is based on a NE555 circuit followed by a push-pull amplifier and a voltage doubler
detector. The oscillation frequency is approximately 32kHz, which must be well DC filtered at the
output to don’t pass through the bias of the RF circuits.
Since MOSFETs have gate threshold voltages up to 5 to 6 volts, they require some gate bias voltage in
most applications. They can be operated in Class C (zero gate bias), but at a cost of low power gain.
• Zero bias is often used in amplifiers intended for signals that do not need linear amplification (such
as FM signals and some forms of CW signals), and efficiencies in excess of 80% are not
uncommon.
• In Class B, the gate bias voltage is set just below the threshold, resulting in zero drain idle current
flow. The power gain is higher than in Class C but the drain efficiency is 10 to 15% lower. Class B
is also suitable only for non-linear amplification. Between classes of operation, one must decide
whether the system has power gain to spare and how important efficiency is. At higher
frequencies, such as UHF, a good compromise may be Class B or even Class AB.
• In Class AB, the gate bias voltage is somewhat higher than the device threshold, resulting in drain
idle current flow. The idle current required to place the device in the linear mode of operation is
usually given in a data sheet. In this respect, MOSFETs are much more sensitive to the level of
idle current than are bipolar transistors. They also require somewhat higher current levels
compared to bipolars of similar electrical size.
The temperature compensation of MOSFETs can be most readily accomplished with networks consisting
of thermistors and resistors.
• The ratio of the two must be adjusted according to the thermistor characteristics and the gFS of the
FET. The changes in the gate threshold voltage are inversely proportional to temperature and
amount to approximately 1 mV/°C. These changes have a larger effect on the Idq of a FET with a
high gFS than one with a low gFS. Unfortunately, the situation is complicated by the fact that gFS is
also reduced at elevated temperatures, making the drain idle current dependent on two variables.
The thermistor is thermally connected into a convenient location in the heat source in a manner similar to
that described for the compensating diodes with bipolar units discussed earlier.
The circuit above shows a typical MOSFET bias voltage source using the 723 IC regulator.
The temperature slope is adjusted by the ratio of the series resistor (R5) and the thermistor (R6).
In addition to maintaining a constant bias voltage, this circuit also features a bias voltage regulation
against changes in the power supply voltage.
Typical MMIC internal schematic (DC blocking caps, Rbias and RFC are external components)
• The current-biased MMIC will attempt to draw more current as the temperature rises.
• The biasing is primarily determined by the current, where the voltage is relatively unimportant.
• The effectiveness of this temperature bias control is dependent on the voltage drop across RBIAS,
a value of up to 4 V may be required for proper stabilization across a minus 25°C to a plus 100°C
temperature range.
• If the RBIAS does not add up to 600Ω or more, then the gain of the MMIC stage will suffer.
• If RBIAS does not compute to be at or over 600Ω, then an RFC should be added in series with RBIAS
to increase the output to this value, or approximately RBIAS + XL > 600Ω.
• These amplifiers are unconditionally stable at all frequencies, and they can be easily cascaded for
higher gain.
The inductor bias-feed circuit is preferable to obtain low-noise performance, high gain, and linearity.
By using an inductor as the bias feed, becomes constant and can increase in the large-signal region to
extend its output power.
Diode and Transistor bias for Linear Power Amplifiers
The use of Class-A and Class-AB amplifiers for linear power amplification relies on the use of a
standing bias current, applied to the base (in case of BJT) in order to bias the RF device into partial or
full conduction. This bias current must remain constant, despite the varying envelope of the input signal
to the amplifier, which will cause significant variations in the collector current (and hence base current)
required by the device.
When considering low power RF amplification, simple resistive biasing techniques may be used
however, such techniques are not appropriate for medium or high-power amplifiers due to their
requirement for low impedance, relative high current, voltage source.
Diode biasing provides a low impedance voltage source, and requires a high standing current to flow
through it than the bias current required by the transistor.
• Whether employing diode or transistor bias, it is essential to thermally connect these components
to the RF transistor itself. This allows the semiconductor bias components to track the power
amplifier’s temperature variations, and thus increase/ decrease the 0.7 V placed across Q1’s
base, maintaining the PA’s collector current at a steady DC level. (As the temperatures rise, a
silicon semiconductor junction’s voltage decreases from its room temperature value of 0.7 V).
• Further, in order to force PA bias stability no matter what the input and output RF power levels
may be, the standing current through the diode or transistor bias components must be high
enough to permit a steady voltage to be maintained across the PA’s base.
The clamping diode circuit presented above can be improved by the addition of an emitter follower to
amplify the diode current, and hence reduce the required current through the diode by a factor to the
current gain of the transistor used. The circuit employs two diodes in series, since one is required to
compensate for the base emitter voltage drop of the transistor.
Bias Modulation Effects
The function of a bias network is to supply an appropriate (and constant) voltage or current to the gate or
base of the device. If the RF signals or their modulation are concerned, it should appear to be a high
impedance at RF, and possibly a very low impedance in the case of modulation signals.
The bias design should not allow such signals to pass to any part of the power supply and the reflected
back to the input of the active device. Signals at the modulation frequency (or harmonics) are generated
by nonlinearities in the base or gate of the active device and these are often reflected, rather than
absorbed by matching network. These modulation frequency signals must be absorbed by the bias
network and not reflect back to the gate or the base of the device, otherwise there will be a modification
of the IM products, and in the symmetry of the side shoulders.
Complex Thermal Compensated Bias circuit for Class-AB BJT Power Amplifiers
• This biasing scheme for RF power transistor provides near-constant low-frequency (1MHz) small-
signal impedance presented at the base of RF transistor.
• The R2/R3 ratio it will set the bias current.
• This bias scheme is capable of providing independent control of bias impedance and class of the
power amplifier for optimum efficiency and linearity.
Biasing Power FET devices is usually simpler than biasing BJT devices. In many cases is sufficient to
provide a bias voltage directly on the gate through suitable impedance. This impedance must be capable
of minimizing the amount of RF feeding into the bias supply.
A typical network consists of a voltage supply (a variable voltage regulator) fed via a bias resistor whose
primary function is to aid the decoupling of the gate from the bias supply, and a quarter-wave
transmission line, which provides the RF isolation between gate and the bias supply.
Optimizing of the MESFET for maximum output power requires the device to be capable of
sustaining large peak-voltage and current amplitudes.
A typical MESFET current vs voltage (I-V) illustrates that with positive gate bias, the MESFET can
conduct current levels of 15% to 20% above saturated drain-source current Ids.
• The maximum current is denoted as Idssm, whereas Idss is measured at zero gate-source bias.
• The transition from the linear operating region to the current saturation region occurs at the drain-
to-source voltage above the knee voltage Vk.
• The highest voltage that can exist between the drain and the source is the gate-to-drain
breakdown voltage Vgdb minus the pinch-off voltage Vp.
• This maximum voltage will be reached only as the drain current approaches zero.
• The drain-to-source voltages below Vk should be avoided because they imply high microwave
losses in the non-saturation region.
LDMOS transistors are CMOS devices designed for high frequency, high voltage operation.
• LDMOS transistors exhibit an annoying characteristic called bias or IDQ drift.
• All LDMOS parts exhibit the hot carrier injection effect to some degree.
• Hot carrier injection results in charge build-up in the gate-drain region, which causes the gate field
to change. This is seen by the user as a change in the quiescent current (IDQ) with a fixed gate
voltage.
• The use of adaptive bias circuits it requires a circuit that adjusts VGS periodically to maintain a
constant IDQ.
A new way to bias an LDMOS amplifier involves digitally converting temperature information and
adjusting the DC bias using Look-Up Table (LUT) memory. The memory is programmed at final test
using measured parameters from the amplifier circuit being tested. DC bias performance is optimized
over the required temperature range.
A very simple and effective way to construct the lookup table is to make measurements at two
temperatures that represent the target range for the product, and then interpolate values for the other
temperatures with a linear regression. A more accurate method would include more temperature points
and then interpolate between those points.
LDMOS amplifiers also have a characteristic IDD drift overtime (drain current reduces for a given VGS), as
well as temperature. This can be addressed with lookup table correction with a slightly higher constant
bias offset, so that over time the IDD will drift closer to the target bias value, not further away.
For the design a low phase-noise oscillator, the biasing circuit should be properly regulated and
filtered to avoid any unwanted signal modulation ore noise injection. Variations on the supply voltages or
currents may also cause undesirable output power fluctuations and frequency drift.
Oscillator biasing of its amplifier section is employed for multiple reasons:
• To allow the use of a single VCC;
• to positions the bias point for a certain class of operation
• to swamp out any device variations in beta
• to stabilize the active device over wide temperature variations.
• some oscillator topologies use noise feedback bias for phase noise cancellation.
For accurate design of the bias of the oscillator to meet the gain and phase conditions (G≥0dB, Phase
shift around the loop=0°) the closed-loop feed back can be broken in an open-loop analysis.
The circuit can be further tuned for optimal performance, in terms of gain and phase margin.
• The DC control PNP transistor Q2 acts both as a DC bias stabilization transistor and a noise
feedback.
• This type of feedback bias circuit can provide a drastic noise improvement within the loop
bandwidth of the circuit used.
• The noise sampling is done in the collector of Q1.
• Q3 connected as a diode provide temperature stabilization.
• The noise improvement can be expanded to 1 MHz off the carrier if the feedback circuit has the
appropriate gain and exactly 180° phase shift within the required bandwidth.
150MHz Oscillator with Noise cancellation feedback bias
Class-C Power Oscillators
When high output power is required, and stability and noise are of less concern, the oscillator may
be biased for class-C operation.