• The Journal of Korean Institute of Electromagnetic Engineering and Science
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• v.17 no.11 s.114
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• pp.1105-1111
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• 2006

In this paper, using low-temperature co-fired ceramic(LTCC) based system-in-package(SiP) technology, a very compact power amplifier LTCC module was designed, fabricated, and then characterized for 60 GHz wireless transmitter applications. In order to reduce the interconnection loss between a LTCC board and power amplifier monolithic microwave integrated circuits(MMIC), bond-wire transitions were optimized and high-isolated module structure was proposed to integrate the power amplifier MMIC into LTCC board. In the case of wire-bonding transition, a matching circuit was designed on the LTCC substrate and interconnection space between wires was optimized in terms of their angle. In addition, the wire-bonding structure of coplanar waveguide type was used to reduce radiation of EM-fields due to interconnection discontinuity. For high-isolated module structure, DC bias lines were fully embedded into the LTCC substrate and shielded with vias. Using 5-layer LTCC dielectrics, the power amplifier LTCC module was fabricated and its size is $4.6{\times}4.9{\times}0.5mm^3$. The fabricated module shows the gain of 10 dB and the output power of 11 dBm at P1dB compression point from 60 to 65 GHz.

• 한국정보통신설비학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2006.08a
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• pp.215-218
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• 2006

In this paper, a small size, $7{\times}6mm^2$, Low Noise Amplifier(LNA) using LTCC process was fabricated with multi-layer structure for 2.4GHz wireless LAN. The measured results demonstrate that the bandwidth is 130 MHz, and the operating frequency is from 2.39GHz to 2.52GHz. The power gain is above 7.3 dB in the operating frequency range and the gain flatness is 0.5 dB. The maximum S11 is -4 dB and the maximum S22 is -7.5 dB. The noise figure is less than 1.83 dB. The measured power gain, S11 and S22 were had poorer performance than the simulation results. The reason for this discrepancy is that the input and output matching was not performed exactly. However, the noise figure of the LTCC low noise amplifier is better than simulation result. It is found that it is possible to fabricate a LTCC low noise amplifier in a small size.

• Journal of IKEEE
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.53-58
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• 2023

In this paper, a Radio Frequency (RF) transformer (TF) based on LTCC (Low Temperature Co-fired Ceramic) for the output stage of differential power amplifiers is presented. Instead of using an usual L-C matching circuit, a small-sized transformer was implemented on the LTCC board and the results were verified through simulation. For reduced size and better performance, a TF using more metal layers was implemented and compared with the existing TF through simulation. As a result of comparison, the proposed TF has an area reduced by 55% and a coupling coefficient increased by 25%, and insertion loss improvement of about 0.4dB at 5GHz was confirmed.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 2006.07c
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• pp.1599-1600
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• 2006

In this paper, a small size, $7{\times}6\;mm^2$, Low Noise Amplifier(LNA) using LTCC process was fabricated with multi-layer structure for 2.4GHz wireless LAN. The measured results demonstrate that the bandwidth is 130 MHz, and the operating frequency is from 2.39GHz to 2.52GHz. The power gain is above 7.3 dB in the operating frequency range and the gain flatness is 0.5 dB. The maximum S11 is -4 dB and the maximum S22 is -7.5 dB. The noise figure is less than 1.83 dB. The measured power gain, S11 and S22 were had poorer performance than the simulation results. The reason for this discrepancy is that the input and output matching was not performed exactly. However, the noise figure of the LTCC low noise amplifier is better than simulation result. It is found that it is possible to fabricate a LTCC low noise amplifier in a small size.

• Journal of the Microelectronics and Packaging Society
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.13-18
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• 2000

Low temperature co-fired ceramics on metal (LTCC-M) is efficient for embedding passive components with good tolerance in a module due to the dimensional stability in x and y directions by the constraint of metal core during the firing. In addition, the radiation noise can be reduced by metal core. In this paper, embedded passive components were introduced and a power amplifier module (PAM) fabricated by using the passive components was explained. The embedded passive components in test patters showed the tolerance of 10~20% and the good repeatability in tolerance of embedded passives was maintained in module fabrication. The shortened traces in multi chip modules (MCMs) make the signal delay time decreased and the embedded passives simplify the packaging processes owing to the less solder points, which enhance the electrical performance and increase the reliability of the modules. The LTCC-M technology is one of the promising candidates for RF application and is expected to expand its applications to power and high performance devices.

• The Journal of Korean Institute of Electromagnetic Engineering and Science
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• v.16 no.10 s.101
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• pp.1020-1027
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• 2005

In this paper, economic miniature RF transmitter module for intelligent transportation system(ITS) is described. This module which consists of ASK modulator, frequency synthesizer, power amplifier is operating at 5.8 GHz frequency band and implemented by using LTCC process technique. Thus, ultra small size of 0.8 CC and improved electrical performances has been obtained. From the test results, transmitting characteristics of 10 dBm ouput power and -46 dBc interchannel interference with 1.024 Mbps ASK modulated have been shown. Frequency synthesizer as a transmitting signal source reveals very short locking time of 26 usec and outstanding phase noise of -115 dBc/Hz at 1 MHz offset from 5.8 GHz center frequency.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2005.07a
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• pp.357-358
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• 2005

Compact power amplifier modules (PAM) for WCDMA/KPCS and GSM/WCDMA dual-band applications based on multilayer low temperature co-fired ceramic (LTCC) substrates are presented in this paper. The proposed modules are composed of an InGaP/GaAs HBT PAs on top of the LTCC substrates and passive components such as RF chokes and capacitors which are embedded in the substrates. The overall size of the modules is less than 6mm $\times$ 6mm $\times$ 0.8mm. The measured result shows that the PAM delivers a power of 28 dBm with a power added efficiency (PAE) of more than 30 % at KPCS band. The adjacent-channel power ratio (ACPR) at 1.25-MHz and 2.25-MHz offset is -44dBc/30kHz and -60dBc/30kHz, respectively, at 28-dBm output power. Also, the PAM for WCDMA band exhibits an output power of 27 dBm and 32-dB gain at 1.95 GHz with a 3.4-V supply. The adjacent-channel leakage ratio (ACLR) at 5-MHz and 10-MHz offset is -37.5dBc/3.84MHz and -48dBc/3.84MHz, respectively. The measured result of the GSM PAM shows an output power of 33.4 dBm and a power gain of 30.4 dB at 900MHz with a 3.5V supply. The corresponding power added efficiency (PAE) is more than 52.6 %.

• JSTS:Journal of Semiconductor Technology and Science
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.229-237
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• 2011

In this paper, a 60 GHz LTCC SiP with low-power CMOS OOK modulator and demodulator is presented. The 60 GHz modulator is designed in a 90-nm CMOS process. The modulator uses a current reuse technique and only consumes 14.4-mW of DC power in the on-state. The measured data rate is up to 2 Gb/s. The 60 GHz OOK demodulator is designed in a 130nm CMOS process. The demodulator consists of a gain boosting detector and a baseband amplifier, and it recovers up to 5 Gb/s while consuming low DC power of 14.7 mW. The fabricated 60 GHz modulator and demodulator are fully integrated in an LTCC SiP with 1 by 2 patch antenna. With the LTCC SiP, 648 Mb/s wireless video transmission was successfully demonstrated at wireless distance of 20-cm.

• The Journal of Korean Institute of Electromagnetic Engineering and Science
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• v.23 no.5
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• pp.613-623
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• 2012

In this paper, we present an ultra miniaturized voltage tuned oscillator, with HMIC-type amplifier and phase shifter, using LTCC artificial dielectric resonator. ADR which consists of periodic conductor patterns and stacked layers has a smaller size than a dielectric resonator. The design specification of ADR is obtained from the design goal of oscillator. The structure of the ADR with a stacked circular disk type is chosen. The resonance characteristic, physical dimension and stack number are analyzed. For miniaturization of ADRO, the ADR is internally implemented at the upper part of the LTCC substrate and the other circuits, which are amplifier and phase shifter are integrated at the bottom side respectively. The fabricated ADRO has ultra small size of $13{\times}13{\times}3mm^3$ and is a SMT type. The designed ADRO satisfies the open-loop oscillation condition at the design frequency. As a results, the oscillation frequency range is 2.025~2.108 GHz at a tuning voltage of 0~5 V. The phase noise is $-109{\pm}4$ dBc/Hz at 100 kHz offset frequency and the power is $6.8{\pm}0.2$ dBm. The power frequency tuning normalized figure of merit is -30.88 dB.

• Journal of the Microelectronics and Packaging Society
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.19-25
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• 2008

In this paper, the front end module (FEM) was proposed for 2.4GHz WLAN band by LTCC multilayer application. The FEM was composed of power amplifier IC, switch IC, and LTCC module. LTCC module consists of output matching circuit and lowpass filter as Tx part, bandpass filter as Rx part. Design of output matching circuit for LTCC was used matching parameter from output matching circuit based on lumped circuit on the PCB board. The dielectric constant of LTCC substrate is 9. The substrate was composed of total 26 layers with each 30um thickness. Ag paste was used for the internal pattern as the conductor material. The size of the module is $4.5mm{\times}3.2mm{\times}1.4mm$. The fabricated FEM showed the gain of 21dB, ACPR of less than -31dBc first side lobe and Less than -59dBc second side lobe and the output power of 23Bm at P1dB.