reconfigurable amplifiers and circuit components for - SMARTech

144 Pages·2014·9.5 MB·English

RECONFIGURABLE AMPLIFIERS AND CIRCUIT
COMPONENTS FOR BUILT-IN-SELF TESTING AND
SELF-HEALING IN SIGE BICMOS TECHNOLOGY
A Thesis
Presented to
The Academic Faculty
by
Duane C. Howard
In Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for the Degree
Doctor of Philosophy in the
School of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
May 2014
Copyright (cid:13)c 2014 by Duane C. Howard
RECONFIGURABLE AMPLIFIERS AND CIRCUIT
COMPONENTS FOR BUILT-IN-SELF TESTING AND
SELF-HEALING IN SIGE BICMOS TECHNOLOGY
Approved by:
Professor John D. Cressler, Advisor Assistant Professor Hua Wang
School of Electrical and Computer School of Electrical and Computer
Engineering Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology Georgia Institute of Technology
Professor Manos E. Tentzeris Professor Todd J. Henry
School of Electrical and Computer Department of Physics and Astronomy
Engineering Georgia State University
Georgia Institute of Technology
Professor John Papapolymerou Date Approved: January 28, 2014
School of Electrical and Computer
Engineering
Georgia Institute of Technology
To my most cherished teacher,
Mr. Oswin Martineau,
“nothing attempted is nothing gained.”
iii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Without the support and guidance of many individuals, this thesis would not have
seen the light of day. I would first like to express my deepest gratitude to my Ph.D.
advisor, Dr. John D. Cressler. He is an enthusiastic teacher, an eternal optimist, and
always encouraging. He is truly the definition of Il Professore.
I would also like to thank the members of my thesis committee, Dr. Manos
Tentzeris and Dr. John Papapolymerou, who have provided significant support and
guidance throughout my time at Georgia Tech, as well as Dr. Hua Wang and Dr.
Todd Henry for graciously agreeing to serve on my defense committee. In particular,
I would like to thank Dr. Kevin Kornegay, for opening the door for me to study at
Georgia Tech.
ThroughoutmytimespentatGeorgiaTech,Ihavebenefitedatremendousamount
from the support of my fellow colleagues. I would like to thank all of the current and
past members of the SiGe Devices and Circuits team. I would particularly like thank
Tushar Thrivikraman, Sachin Seth, Stan Phillips, Chris Coen, Rob Schmid, Troy
England, Prabir Saha, Subramaniam Shankar, Ryan Diestelhorst, Adilson Cardoso,
Nelson Lourenco, and John Poh. Each of these individuals has provided invaluable
support for various projects critical to the completion of this thesis and, in his own
way, done their part to make my life as a graduate student enjoyable.
I am grateful for the support of Northrup Grumman and Tower Jazz Semiconduc-
tor for the sponsorship of my research projects, as well as Vanderbilt University and
U.C. Berkeley for the use of their facilities for radiation studies. Finally, I would like
to thank my family and friends for their encouragement and support throughout the
years. It has been a long journey, but immensely rewarding in the end.
iv
TABLE OF CONTENTS
DEDICATION iii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iv
LIST OF TABLES viii
LIST OF FIGURES ix
GLOSSARY xiv
SUMMARY xvi
I INTRODUCTION 1
1.1 Silicon Germanium HBT BiCMOS Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
1.1.1 Temperature and Radiation Effects in SiGe Technology . . . . 9
1.2 Research Objectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
II CIRCUIT COMPONENTS FOR SELF-HEALING AND BIST
APPLICATIONS 13
2.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.2 SiGe HBT Collector Current Source Measure Unit (SMU) . . . . . . 14
2.2.1 Circuit Analysis and Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2.2.2 Measured Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
2.3 On-chip SiGe Current Gain Characterization Circuit . . . . . . . . . 17
2.3.1 Source Measure Unit Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2.3.2 Measured Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
2.3.3 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
2.4 Tunable Microstrip Lines for Millimeter-
wave
Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
2.4.1 Slow-wave-tunable Microstrip Line Design . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
2.4.2 Measured Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
2.4.3 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
v
2.5 Revised Tunable MLN based on nFET Switches . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
2.5.1 Measured Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
2.5.2 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
2.6 A Broadband, Millimeter-wave, Asymmetri-
cal
Marchand Balun in 180 nm SiGe BiCMOS Technology . . . . . . 48
2.6.1 Marchand Balun Analysis and Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
2.6.2 Measured Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
2.6.3 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
III RECONFIGURABLE LOW NOISE AMPLIFIERS 57
3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
3.2 An Ultra-wideband LNA with Gain and Return Loss Control . . . . 58
3.2.1 Circuit Analysis and Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
3.2.2 Measured Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
3.2.3 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
3.3 A SiGe LNA with Mitigating Capability for Radiation-induced
Performance Degradation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
3.3.1 LNA Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
3.3.2 Performance Tuning Methodology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
3.3.3 Measured Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
3.3.4 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
IV SELF-HEALING MICROWAVE SYSTEMS WITH
RECONFIGURABLE LOW NOISE AMPLIFIERS 84
4.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
4.2 A SiGe Receiver with On-chip BIST Capability for Self-healing . . . 84
4.2.1 System Architecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
4.2.2 Self-healing Methodology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
4.2.3 Measured Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
4.2.4 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
vi
4.3 Mitigation of TID Degradation using the Self-healing Receiver . . . . 102
4.3.1 Pre- and Post-irradiated Nominal Performance . . . . . . . . . 103
4.3.2 Post-irradiated Self-healing Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
4.3.3 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
V CONCLUSION 116
5.1 Summary of Contributions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
5.2 Future Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
REFERENCES 120
VITA 128
vii
LIST OF TABLES
1 SMU Current Consumption Over Temperature. . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
2 Comparison with Other Baluns Operating in Similar Frequency Bands. 56
3 Maximum Control Knob Ranges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
4 Target Specifications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
5 Pre- and Post-tuned Gain and OIP3 for Three Dies at 200 krad, 13 GHz 81
6 Pre- and Post-tuned Gain and OIP3 for Three Dies at 500 krad, 13 GHz 81
7 Pre- and Post-tuned Gain and OIP3 for Three Dies at 2 Mrad, 13 GHz 81
8 Pre- and Post-tuned NF for Three Dies at 200 krad at 14 and 16 GHz 82
9 Pre- and Post-tuned NF for Three Dies at 500 krad at 14 and 16 GHz 82
10 Pre- and Post-tuned NF for Three Dies at 2 Mrad at 14 and 16 GHz 82
11 Summary of Best Self-healing Results at 8 GHz, 10 GHz, and 16 GHz. 100
12 Monitored Voltages and Currents of Supplies Pre- and Post-irradiated. 108
viii
LIST OF FIGURES
1 The typical statistical distributions of the current gain (β) of SiGe
HBTs in two different technology nodes are compared. The variance
of the distribution in 0.12 µm technology is larger than that in the 0.25
µm process (after [66]). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2 A warm-box typically used in NASA’s Mars Rovers. . . . . . . . . . . 4
3 Block diagram of a general self-healing system. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
4 Structure of 3rd generation SiGe HBT (courtesy of IBM). . . . . . . . 7
5 (a) A typical doping and Ge profile for a SiGe HBT (b) Energy band
diagram for a SiGe HBT (solid lines) and silicon BJT (dashed lines)
along with the bandgap narrowing effect (after [6]). . . . . . . . . . . 8
6 Forward Gummel characteristics of a third-generation SiGe HBT be-
fore and after exposure to multi-Mrad total dose (after [16]). . . . . . 11
7 SMU circuit attached to the collector node of the SiGe HBT DUT. . 15
8 Schematic of SMU attached to the collector node of the SiGe HBT DUT. 16
9 Conceptual diagram of SMU and the RF circuit on the same die. . . 17
10 Voltage regulator and logarithmic amplifier stages of the SMU. . . . . 18
11 Schematic of complete SMU circuit. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
12 DIP with attached die and magnified micrograph of the SMU. . . . . 21
13 Schematic of measurement setup for the SMU including cryostat, 4156,
and MATLAB control. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
14 Current gain vs. V at 293 K. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
BE
15 Current gain vs. V at 143 K. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
BE
16 Current gain vs. V at 343 K. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
BE
17 Peak current gain vs. temperature. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
18 Microstrip cross-section with ground plane and field lines. . . . . . . . 28
19 (a) MLN line and (b) Metal strip backplane with design parameters. . 29
20 (a)TunableMLNwithHBTs,and(b)tunableMLNwithnMOSswitches. 32
ix
21 Backplane current density plots: (a) Backplane sections floating, (b)
Backplane sections grounded, (c) First two backplanes grounded and
the last two floating, and (d) First and last sections grounded, middle
sections floating. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
22 (a)InsertionlossfortunableMLNlinewithnMOSdevices(b)Insertion
loss for tunable MLN line with HBT devices. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
23 (a) Characteristic impedance for the tunable MLN line with nMOS
devices. (b) Characteristic impedance for the tunable MLN line with
SiGe HBT devices. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
24 Measured and simulated phase difference of tunable MLN with nMOS
devices between switch states 1-2 and switch states 1–3 from 55–110
GHz. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
25 Measured and simulated phase difference of tunable MLN with SiGe
devices between switch states 1-2 and switch states 1–3 from 55–110
GHz. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
26 Schematic of tunable MLN with nFET switches. . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
27 3D model of tunable MLN. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
28 Annotated die micrograph of tunable MLN. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
29 Smith Chart showing input return loss of tunable MLN for V = 0 V
ctl
and 3.3 V. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
30 Insertion loss of tunable MLN for V = 0, 0.9 and, 3.3 V. . . . . . . 45
ctl
31 Input resistance of tunable MLN for V = 0, 0.9 and, 3.3 V. . . . . . 46
ctl
32 Input reactance of tunable MLN for V = 0, 0.9 and, 3.3 V. . . . . . 47
ctl
33 Phase between input and output ports of tunable MLN for V = 0,
ctl
0.9 and, 3.3 V. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
34 Schematic of the symmetrical Marchand balun. . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
35 Circuit model of an asymmetrical Marchand balun. . . . . . . . . . . 50
36 3D EM model of balun. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
37 Die micrograph of balun. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
38 Balun insertion Loss. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
39 Balun isolation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
40 Phase difference between the balanced ports. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
41 Amplitude imbalance of the balun. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
x