UC Berkeley

Scaling in silicon semiconductor process technology, although driven by digital applications, has also enabled the operation of analog integrated circuits (ICs) at higher and higher frequencies. Over the past 15-20 years, ICs operating at millimeter-wave (mm-Wave), the frequency range between 30 GHz and 300 GHz, have been demonstrated with increasing performance and complexity.

One important application for mm-Wave ICs has been in automotive radar, where they have been used to make accurate measurements of distance and velocity with minimal processing required. There also has been significant interest in adapting this technology for non-vehicular applications, such as gesture recognition, room occupancy detection, or heart-rate monitoring, where performance and energy efficiency are both important. The first part of this thesis describes a custom IC for gesture recognition radar demonstrating state-of-the-art energy efficiency. The IC consists of four transmitters and four receivers with shared frequency generation circuitry, and is packaged onto a 1.2x1.2cm antenna module containing eight antennas.

The other key application for mm-Wave technology has been for wireless communication. Products are finally coming to the market now that offer nearly 5 Gigabits per second of wireless data throughput for indoor wireless LAN applications, and mm-Wave technology will likely play a role in the next generation of wireless cellular standards as well. To demonstrate the possibility for yet-higher data rates to be achieved, a broad-bandwidth custom integrated circuit transceiver has been designed targeting a factor of 10 improvement in wireless data throughput beyond commercially available technology. The second half of this thesis will discuss the details of a transceiver and antenna design for broad-bandwidth and high data rate operation.