DESIGN OF ULTRA WIDEBAND OSCILLATOR IN 0.

18µM STANDARD CMOS

TECHNOLOGY

Amel Neifar, Ghazi Bouzid, Hatem Trabelsi and Mohamed Masmoudi

National Engineers School of Sfax/ Micro Electro Thermal Systems (METS) Research Group, Sfax,
Tunisia
amel.neifar@gmail.com, ghazi.bouzid@enis.rnu.tn, hatem.trabelsi@isetsf.rnu.tn and mohamed.masmoudi@enis.rnu.tn

ABSTRACT Table1. IR-UWB PHY channels frequencies

This paper describes the design of a 3-5 GHz oscillator for

Impulse-Radio Ultra-Wideband (IR-UWB) transceiver in
the 0.18µm CMOS technology. The most important
specifications for the voltage control oscillator (VCO) are
provided and architecture for an existing frequency plan is
introduced along with a discussion on its performance and
implementation. The simulated VCO can achieve very wide
tuning range along with low phase noise performance that
varies from -92.02dBcHz to -73dBc/Hz at 1 MHz frequency
offset from the carrier and the overall power consumption is
28.1 mW from a 1.8V voltage supply.

Index Terms— TAI-based VCO, UWB, Hartley We aim to design an ultra wideband transmission
architecture architecture within the standard IEEE.15.4a using BPSK
modulation and operating in the UWB third channel of the
1. INTRODUCTION low band. This transmitter is supposed to transpose
baseband signal of 10 MHz to 510 MHz into 3.1 GHz to 4.8
The interest in UWB systems has significantly increased GHz RF frequency. The frequency transposition is
since 2002 when the American Federal Communications performed by a mixer which is controlled by a local
Commission (FCC) released the use of a 7.5 GHz band oscillator LO signal as shown in Figure 1. Actually, the LO
spectrum (3.1–10.6 GHz) for short-range and high-data rate which should deliver a central frequency (the carrier) of 4.5
wireless communications with a power spectral density of - Ghz, is a voltage control oscillator and its design and
41.3 dBm/MHz [1]. And recent research into the design of performances are presented in this paper.
Ultra-Wide Band transceiver architectures shows several
types of UWB technology such as Direct-Sequence UWB
(DS-UWB), Impulse Radio (IR) over the 802.15.4a standard
and Multi-Band Orthogonal Frequency Division
Multiplexing (MB-OFDM) over the 802.15.3a standard. The
DS-UWB and MB-OFDM are potential applicants for
wireless personal area network (WPAN) applications;
however, the IR has attractive specifications for imaging Figure1. Architecture blocks of UWB transmitter
system and radar system applications [2] [3]. And according
to the IEEE 802.15.4a standard, IR-UWB devices can 2. DESIGN OF THE VCO
operate in three independent bands which are specified in
the table 1 below. 2.1. VCO topology

Ultra wideband wireless technology has promoted designing

devices covering wide bandwidth over several gigahertz.
Among them are UWB oscillators that demand extending Req
²
the tunability bandwidth in the range of 3 to 10 GHz. An ² ² ²
effective solution to this has been to use multiple
² ²
narrowband VCOs, each covering a portion of the required Leq
² ² ²
range. This solution requires high cost and increased design
complexity. Alternatively, a method to achieve this is the ²
use of LC oscillators based on tunable active inductors Geq
(TAI) because they present major advantages over passive
inductors in terms of area, tunability, and higher Q factors Ceq= Cgs3
despite their noise and nonlinearity [4]. There are several Where:
challenges in realizing integrated VCOs with this technique gmx: the transconductance of transistor x
and a TAI-based VCO may be implemented either using the gdsx: output conductance of drain-source of transistor x
Hartley topology shown in Figure 2 or using the Colpitts Cgsx: capacitance bulk-source of transistor x
topology[5].
Considering the inductances associated with the two TAIs
are L1 et L2 figure1), basically the frequency of operation is
1/√(L1+L2)C. However, when manipulating high
frequencies, the parasitic capacitance and the inductor of the
transistor M1 should be taken into consideration. So, the
size of the transistor M1 will hardly affect the frequency of
oscillation.

2.2. Circuit design

Figure 2. A typical MOS Hartley oscillator To obtain an optimum size for the transistor M1, we have
adopted the curve of figure 4 which illustrate the effect of
In Hartley oscillator, the LC network has two inductors and the width (W) of the transistor M1 on the oscillation
one capacitance. The NMOS amplifier is connected in a frequency as well as on the phase noise in the 0.18µm
common gate configuration. The capacitance C2 has one CMOS technology [6].
port connected to L1 and the other port connected to
L2.This circuit is an important building block in variety of
RF applications. Correct equations for frequency, amplitude
of oscillation and phase noise are some designing challenges
of LC oscillators as any other types VCOs. And in order to
calculate the parameters of the circuit, several methods have
been presented to make the active inductors. One of them is
connecting two transconductors with resistive feedback
implemented by connecting the resistor (Rf) in parallel with
a transistor as shown if figure 3.a. Figure 3.b however,
presents the equivalent circuit of the active inductor.

Figure 4. Frequency and phase noise variation versus W

The oscillation frequency increase when decreasing the

width of the transistor M1 and that’s obvious because when
increasing W, the parasitic capacitance of the transistor
increase and so the total tank LC capacitance. So to obtain
an optimum frequency of 4.5 GHz required for our
application, we should take W1= 5µm and that should give
Figure 3. a.TAI topology b. equivalent circuit of inductor nearly -90 dBc/ Hz phase noise.
The equivalent circuit model of the Rf active inductor
3. RESULT AND DISCUSSIONS
shown in Figure 3b includes four parameters Ceq, Req, Leq
and Geq which will help to analyze this circuit and design it
The proposed architecture of the UWB VCO shown in
for simulations. The value of each component is expressed
Figure 5 has been designed and simulated using TSMC 0.18
below.
µm CMOS technology.
 vdd
L
vdd
L1 R
R3
vdd vdd
R
R4

C C
C4 C3
M10
vout
vdd
I_DC C
C
SRC1 C5
C2
vdd
I_DC
SRC4
x
M9 vdd

y R
R1 M4 vb
R M1
M11
vb y R2 M6
M5 Vt
I_DC M2
Vt
I_DC SRC2
M7
SRC3
C
C1
M3

M8

Figure 5. Simulated Hartley VCO Figure 7. Phase noise simulated of the VCO circuit.

The drain of the transistor M1 was connected to a feedback To determine the tunability bandwidth of the TAI VCO, we
loop and the voltage supply to a series of capacitance and an have varied the control voltage V accomplished by the
RF circuit choke in order to suppress harmonics and also to transistor in feedback path (figure 3) as long as its Vgs<Vt.
prevent the drain of the transistor M1 of any other loading Thus, the sizing of M1 is an important factor for tuning
effects. Also, the resistor on the gate of the transistor M1 range. By increasing the aspect ratio (W/L) of M1, it needs a
determines the output amplitude. For our case, assuming smaller gate voltage. As a result, the tuning transistor turns
that the mixer, connected to the VCO, is followed by a on with smaller voltage values, which in turn reduces the
power amplifier as shown in figure 1, an output signal of tuning Range [6]. Figure 8 shows the tuning range
300mV can satisfy the operation. characteristics versus the external controlled voltage Vt. The
The output signal of the VCO is illustrated in Figure 6, the VCO circuit generates a sinusoidal signal of 4.5 GHz
bias voltage Vb is above the threshold voltage V th, so that centered frequency. The carrier frequency varies linearly
the MOS transistor never enters its cutoff region and voltage versus tuning voltage Vt from 0.1V to 2.2 V with a tuning
tune V of the inductor is constant in this case. range Trange of 10% which is defined by the following
expression:

400
m1
time= 5.852nsec
Trange = 100
300 ! !
vout=0.224 m1
m2
Peak 200

m2
vout, mV

100
time= 6.072nsec
vout=0.222 0
Peak
-100

-200

-300
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

time, nsec

Figure 6. Transient output signal of Hartley VCO.

We note that the response time taken for the circuit to

stabilize and return to the steady state is almost 4 ns. The
response time is relatively low, so the oscillator is fast, we
Figure 8. Tuning range characteristics versus voltage control V
do not risk delaying the transmitted signal. This figure also
shows that the output signal has a period of 0.22 ns therefore A Tuning range of 3 GHz- 8GHz is achieved by varying
the oscillation frequency is 4.54 GHz. However, the signal Vtune from 1V to 2.3V, as shown in Figure 7 and at 1MHz
has a slight variation in the amplitude, which stabilized after frequency offset, phase noise varies from -92.02dBcHz to -
about 20 ns. 73dBc/Hz.
Figure 7 presents the simulated phase noise of the Hartley In order to optimize the performance of VCO in terms of
TAI VCO circuit. The phase noise is -80 dBc/Hz at an offset consumption and phase noise, several iterations of
frequency of 1 MHz. According to recent publications the simulations were made to find a good compromise between
proposed topology gives good results. noise / consumption. Decreasing current generates low
degradation in phase noise for the circuit while we enjoy an
acceptable consumption (about 28mW). However, in the
opposite case, the power reaches higher while the noise 6. REFERENCES
simulated phase is slightly improved value. To better judge
the performance of the oscillator, we calculated the figure of [1] Federal Communications Commission, “FCC notice of
merit (FOM) for a frequency offset of 1 MHz using the proposed rulemaking, revision of part 15 of the commission’s rules
following expression [7]: regarding ultra wideband transmission system,” FCC, Washington
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01 2 6 7
FOM=Pn Foffset , 20 log 5 10 log [2] S. Roy, J. R. Foerster, S. Somayazulu and D. G. Leeper, Ultra
01 34 8
wideband radio design: The promise of high-speed, short range
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which is the relative frequency for which the phase noise is
calculated, Fosc is the oscillating frequency and Pdiss is the [3] R. Fleming, C. Kushner, G. Roberts and U. Nandiwada, Rapid
power consumed. It may be noted that the higher the figure acquisition for ultra wideband localizers, IEEE Conf. Ultra
Wideband Systems Technology, Baltimore, Maryland, USA
of merit is low (as its negative value in dB), the more stable
(2002), pp. 245_249.
the VCO will be.
The VCO consumes a total power equal to 28.1mW and [4] S. H. Elahi, A. Nabavi, “A UWB LNA with Interference
thus the FOM calculated is -151.61 dBc. Rejection Using Enhanced-Q Active Inductor,” Japan, IEICE
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4. COMPARISON
[5] A novel ultra-wideband microwave chaotic Colpitts oscillator,
The VCO circuit designed is simulated in a 0.18µm CMOS IEEE 14th Annual Wireless and Microwave Technology
technology with a power supply of 1.8V. The total power is Conference (WAMICON), 2013.
28.1mW, with dc current of 2mA in the active inductor and
17mA in the main core of oscillator. Tuning range of 3GHz- [6] M. Mehrabian, A. Nabavi “An Ultra Wide Tuning Range VCO
8 GHz is achieved by varying the control voltage from 1V with Active Tunable Inductors,” International Review of Electrical
Engineering, pp. 931 - 937, 2008.
to 2.3V which amply satisfies the needs of our applications
since we are working on the band going from 3.1 to 4.8 [7] A. Carrera, M. Rodriguez, G. Rohmer, “A Comparison of 0.35
GHz. At 1MHz frequency offset, phase noise varies from - /spl mu/m CMOS Image- Reject Mixer Architectures for LV-LP
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comparison with other similar designs shows that this UWB [8] Rajarshi Mukhopadhyay, John D. Cressler, and Joy Laskar, “
VCO presents good performances in term of tuning range Reconfigurable RFICs in Si-Based Technologies for a Compact
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Table 3. comparison with Previously simulated VCOs

Year frequency Process Ref.

range(GHz)
2005 2.70~5.40 0.18µm [8]
2007 3.80 ~ 7.40 0.18µm [6]
2010 3.20~4.80 0.35µm [9]
2013 3.0~8.0 0.18µm This work

5. CONCLUSION

A fully integrated ultra wide band voltage control oscillator

work dedicated to UWB transmitter is presented in this
work. The proposed design based on inductive tuning,
realized by the tunable active inductor (TAI) under a
0.18µm CMOS technology, can provide a tuning range
between 3-8 GHz using Hartley structure. As a perspective
for this work we can improve phase noise using techniques
such as PLL-based feedback and harmonic tuning which has
shown that the phase noise could be improved of 1-3dB [6].