1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to a mixer. More particularly, the present invention relates to a sub-harmonic mixer having LC-folded cascode.
2. Description of Related Art
A direct-conversion receiver (or homodyne receiver) uses one time down conversion operation in its structure for directly converting a radio frequency (RF) signal into a base band signal, so it is also called zero-IF receiver. The frequency of the poly-phase local oscillation (LO) signal produced by such receiver is very close to the frequency of the RF signal, thus, image noise interference can be avoided, and no image rejection filter is required to be disposed before mixing the RF signal and the poly-phase LO signal because of the disappearance of image noise. Accordingly, compared to other receiver structures such as a superheterodyne receiver, a direct-conversion receiver has the advantages such as simple structure and single chip, and is being adopted more and more in today's transceivers.
Even though the direct-conversion receiver has the foregoing advantages, the structure thereof still has some disadvantages. For example, DC offset is one of the problems thereof. The production of DC offset is mainly because that the isolation between the input terminal (here referred to as input terminal of RF signal) of the mixer and the low noise amplifier (LNA) and the input terminal of the mixer for receiving the poly-phase LO signal is not infinite, thus, when the poly-phase LO signal appears at the input terminal of RF signal due to feedthrough effect, the poly-phase LO signal will be self-mixed with the original poly-phase LO signal and further the DC offset will be produced. In addition, the problem of even-order distortion should be noted too because the direct-conversion receiver does not have an image rejection filter before mixing the signals, so that the even-order distortion produced by non-linear circuit may also be directly transmitted to the output of the mixer along with the disturbing signal around the RF signal through feedthrough effect, so that the RF signal to be received originally may be further affected.
To resolve the aforementioned problems, the direct-conversion receiver adopts the conventional sub-harmonic mixer (SHM) as shown in
However, in the actual monolithic process, the isolation provided by the conventional SHM is always affected due to unsymmetrical circuit caused by mismatching components. Thus, how to improve the isolation of the input terminal of a conventional SHM by using original circuit structure, so as to reduce the leakage signal of the poly-phase LO signal and even-order distortion caused by disturbing signal at the input terminal of the RF signal, has become the biggest challenge in the application of direct-conversion receiver.
Accordingly, the present invention is directed to provide a sub-harmonic mixer (SHM), wherein a leakage signal is oriented to a first voltage or a second voltage by a resonance circuit so that the SHM can have very good isolation, and the problems of DC offset and even-order distortion in the application of direct-conversion receiver which uses SHM can be resolved.
According to another aspect of the present invention, a down converter is provided, wherein the self-mixing and even-order distortion caused by leakage signal are reduced, and the performance of the down converter is improved by adopting the excellent isolation of the SHM.
To achieve the aforementioned and other objectives, the present invention provides an SHM for mixing a poly-phase local oscillation (LO) signal and a radio frequency (RF) signal so as to produce a base band signal. The SHM includes a differential amplifying unit, a current buffer unit, and a switching unit. The differential amplifying unit amplifies the RF signal. The current buffer unit is coupled to the differential amplifying unit for amplifying the gain of the output signal of the differential amplifying unit. The switching unit is coupled to the current buffer unit for switching the output signal of the current buffer unit to the base band signal based on the poly-phase LO signal.
According to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention, the differential amplifying unit includes a first resonance circuit, and the current buffer unit includes a second resonance circuit. To mix the poly-phase LO signal and the RF signal for producing the base band signal, the following steps are included. First, the differential amplifying unit amplifies the RF signal, and the amplified RF signal is oriented to the current buffer unit by the first resonance circuit; meanwhile, the leakage signal produced by the local resonance signal is oriented to the first voltage by the first resonance circuit. Next, the current buffer unit coupled to the differential amplifying unit amplifies the gate of the output signal of the differential amplifying unit and orients the output signal of the current buffer unit to the switching unit by using the second resonance circuit; meanwhile, the second resonance circuit also orients the leakage signal produced by the local resonance signal to the second voltage. Finally, the switching unit switches the output signal of the current buffer unit to a base band signal based on the poly-phase LO signal.
The resonance frequencies of the foregoing first resonance circuit and second resonance circuit are the same as the frequency of the RF signal. The first voltage is an supply voltage, and the second voltage is a ground voltage.
According to an exemplary embodiment, the SHM can be applied to a direct-conversion receiver.
According to yet another aspect of the present invention, a down converter is provided, which is used for converting a RF signal into a base band signal. The down converter includes a signal producer and an SHM. Wherein the SHM includes a differential amplifying unit, a current buffer unit, and a switching unit. The signal producer is used for providing a poly-phase LO signal. The SHM coupled to the signal producer is used for mixing the poly-phase LO signal and a RF signal to produce a base band signal. Wherein, the procedure of the SHM producing the base band signal includes: the differential amplifying unit amplifying the RF signal; next, the current buffer unit coupled to the differential amplifying unit amplifying the gate of the output signal of the differential amplifying unit; finally, the output signal of the current buffer unit being converted into the base band signal by using the switching unit coupled to the current buffer unit and the signal producer based on the poly-phase LO signal. Accordingly, the down converter can achieve the purpose of converting a RF signal into a base band signal.
According to the down converter in an exemplary embodiment, the signal producer includes a local oscillator and a phase shifter. The local oscillator is used for producing a LO signal so that the phase shifter connected in series between the local oscillator and the switching unit can convert the LO signal into a plurality of LO signals of different offsets to be output as poly-phase LO signals.
According to an exemplary embodiment, the down converter can be applied to a direct-conversion receiver.
According to the present invention, the structure combining a differential amplifying unit and a current buffer unit is adopted, so that the SHM can use a first resonance circuit and a second resonance circuit to orient the leakage signal to a first voltage or a second voltage. Accordingly, along with the increase of the isolation of the SHM, the DC offset and the even-order distortion in the direct-conversion receiver using the SHM can be considerably reduced.
In order to make the aforementioned and other objects, features and advantages of the present invention comprehensible, a preferred embodiment accompanied with figures is described in detail below.
It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary, and are intended to provide further explanation of the invention as claimed.
The accompanying drawings are included to provide a further understanding of the invention, and are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification. The drawings illustrate embodiments of the invention and, together with the description, serve to explain the principles of the invention.
As shown in
The resonance circuit 401 includes inductances L42 and L43 and capacitors C45 and C46. The resonance circuit 402 includes inductances L44 and L45 and capacitors C47 and C48. The first terminals of the inductances L42 and L43 and capacitors C45 and C46 are coupled to a first voltage. The second terminals of the inductances L42 and the capacitor C45 are coupled to the drains of the N-type transistor MN41. The second terminals of the inductance L43 and the capacitor C46 are coupled to the drain of the N-type transistor MN42. The first terminals of the inductance L44 and the capacitor C47 are coupled to the drain of the P-type transistor MP41. The first terminals of the inductance L45 and the capacitor C48 are coupled to the drain of the P-type transistor MP42. The second terminals of the inductances L44 and L45 and the second terminals of the capacitors C47 and C48 are coupled to the second voltage.
Please refer to
Next, the current buffer unit 302 receives the amplified RF signal by using the sources of the P-type transistors MP41 and MP42. The inductances L44 and L45 provide low impedance path to form the DC bias current of the P-type transistors MP41 and MP42. Here, the P-type transistors MP41 and MP42 connected in common gate can not only improve the isolation of the current buffer unit 302, but also amplify the gain of the output signal of the differential amplifying unit 301. To orient the RF signal amplified by P-type transistors MP41 and MP42 to the switching unit 303, the resonance circuit 402 adopts the same method as the resonance circuit 401 to operate the resonance frequency at the frequency of the RF signal, so that the output signal of the current buffer unit 302 is oriented to the switching unit 303. Meanwhile, the resonance circuit 402 may also orient the leakage signal produced when the poly-phase LO signal at the input terminals 310a and 310b, or the even-order distortion produced by the disturbing signal through non-linear circuit to the second voltage.
Finally, the LO signals LO4_0°, LO4_90°, LO4_180°, and LO4_270° included in the poly-phase LO signal are respectively received by the gates of the N-type transistors MN43 and MN49, the gates of the N-type transistors MN45 and MN48, the gates of the N-type transistors MN 44 and MN410, and the gates of the N-type transistors MN 46 and MN47 in the switching unit 303. Here, the N-type transistors MN43˜MN410, which has operation characteristics of switches, switch the output signal of the current buffer unit 302 to the base band signal based on the LO signals LO4_0°, LO4_90°, LO4_180° and LO4_270°. Wherein, the phase shifts of the LO signals LO4_0°, LO4_90°, LO4_180°, and LO4_270° are respectively 0 degree, 90 degree, 180 degree, and 270 degree.
The foregoing signal producer 501 includes a local oscillator 510 and a phase shifter 520. The phase shifter 520 is connected between the local oscillator 510 and the switching unit 303. Wherein, the local oscillator 510 is used for producing LO signal, so that the phase shifter 520 converts the received LO signal into a plurality of LO signals of different phase shifts to be output as poly-phase LO signals. In the embodiment in
In overview, in the present invention, the structure combining the differential amplifying unit and current buffer unit is adopted, so that the isolation of the SHM can be effectively improved when the SHM orients the leakage signal to the first voltage and the second voltage by using the first resonance circuit and the second resonance circuit. Accordingly, the circuit performances of related circuits which have to use SHM, such as down converter, direct-conversion receiver etc, can be greatly improved along with the increase of the isolation of the SHM. In particular, to direct-conversion receiver, the DC offset and even-order distortion thereof can be considerably reduced.
It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications and variations can be made to the structure of the present invention without departing from the scope or spirit of the invention. In view of the foregoing, it is intended that the present invention cover modifications and variations of this invention provided they fall within the scope of the following claims and their equivalents.
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20080032659 A1 | Feb 2008 | US |