Terahertz CMOS ICs Become Feasible

摘要

Silicon technology now offers a path to both capable and economical systems operating at 200 GHz and beyond. This option has arisen because of recent progress in complementary-metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) integrated circuits and silicon-germanium (SiGe) heterojunction-bipolar-transistor (HBT) technology. Underscoring this shift is the recent demonstration of the following: a 140-GHz fundamental-mode voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) in 90-nm CMOS; a 410-GHz push-push VCO with an on-chip patch antenna in 45-nm CMOS; a 125-GHz Schottky-diode frequency doubler; a 50-GHz phase-locked loop (PLL) with a frequency-doubled output at 100 GHz; a 180-GHz Schottky-diode detector; and a 700-GHz plasma wave detector in 130-nm CMOS.