Graduation Year

2003

Document Type

Thesis

Degree

M.S.E.E.

Degree Granting Department

Electrical Engineering

Major Professor

Lawrence P. Dunleavy , Ph.D.

Co-Major Professor

Rudolf Henning, Ph.D.

Committee Member

Tom Weller, Ph.D.

Keywords

transistor, hemt, noise, nonlinear, GaAs

Abstract

This research effort advances millimeter-wave transistor modeling in a current RF/Microwave circuit simulator (Agilent's Advanced Design System-ADS) for small-signal noise and large signal simulations. The device modeled is a metamorphic High Electron Mobility Transistor (mHEMT) supplied by Raytheon RF components. Because of their structure, these new low noise devices are used in this work to test the abilities to accurately model in the sub 0.5dB noise figure territory and to study model prediction into W-band (75-110 GHz).

New modeling issues discussed in this thesis involve the effects of noise modeling in relation to the small-signal model parameters. The noise modeling identifies two methods of extraction and how to determine good noise data. Other modeling topics addressed are the use of an advanced nonlinear model, and the ability to optimize for gain compression in the nonlinear model.

Several measurement systems were used in the extraction and validation of this modeling effort. They consist of the ATN NP5 noise system, Maury Automated Tuner System, Agilent's IC-CAP, and Gateway's Special. The concept behind using these systems was to construct a complete modeling reference for a transistor and validate it against noise parameter and nonlinear measured data. Since the modeling work for this thesis is built on previous work, one goal has been to bring past USF field-effect transistor (FET) modeling efforts up to date and refine them for future use.

The noise measurements were compared to results from Raytheon to validate the USF ATN noise parameter measurement system. Also the IC-CAP modeling system has been validated in measuring the test devices using the Maury load-pull system.

Small-signal and noise modeling were accomplished using techniques standardized from several technical papers and prior USF Ph.D. work relative to the model extraction. The IC-CAP modeling software also provided a straightforward platform for large-signal model extraction that is documented in this thesis. Using optimization in ADS, a final nonlinear was created.

Measured DC, S-parameter, noise parameters, harmonic power, TOI, load-pull, and efficiency measurements were shown to compare well with model data simulated in ADS. Temperature scaling was also executed using a linear approximation of model values over measured temperatures in the noise model. The results presented show that the models developed illustrate good fitting of the behavior of the mHEMT device.

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