A High Tuning Range Voltage Controlled Oscillator Based on Differential Active Inductor

In this paper, a high tuning range Voltage Controlled Oscillator (VCO) with high output power based on differential active inductor is presented. In the proposed VCO circuit, the coarse frequency is achieved by tuning the differential active inductor. The circuit is simulated with Cadence Spectra using 0.18 μm CMOS technology and presents output frequency range from 300 MHz to 900 MHz. The phase noise is -89 dBc/Hz at a 1 MHz frequency offset. The output power is from +10 dBm at 300 MHz to +12 dBm at 900 MHz. The total power consumption is 860 μW using 1.8 V DC power supply. By comparing the proposed VCO with the general VCO topology, the results show that this VCO architecture by using the novel, low power and high-tunable differential active inductor circuit, presents a better performance regarding low chip size, low power consumption, high tuning range and high output power.

A High Tuning Range Voltage Controlled Oscillator Based on Differential Active Inductor Keywords:

Voltage Controlled Oscillator (VCO) , Differential Active Inductor (DAI) , Passive Spiral Inductor , Phase Noise , Output Power