Abstract—A 24-GHz +14.5-dBm fully integrated power amplifier with on-chip 50ohm input and output matching is demonstrated in 0.18um CMOS. The use of substrate-shielded coplanar waveguide structures for matching networks results in low passive loss and small die size. Simple circuit techniques based on stability criteria derived result in an unconditionally stable amplifier. The power amplifier achieves a power gain of 7 dB and a maximum single-ended output power of +14.5-dBm with a 3-dB bandwidth of 3.1 GHz, while drawing 100 mA from a 2.8-V supply. The chip area is 1.26 mm2.
Index Terms—Amplifier stability, CMOS integrated circuits, coplanar waveguides, phased arrays, radio transmitters, silicon.