ELEN 665 (ESS), AMSC TAMU

RF SYSTEM DESIGN CONSIDERATIONS

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Transceiver Building Blocks

Duplexer
LNA ADC
Filter

Up
Converters

How do you assign specifications to each building block?

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• Each block shares part of the total specification of the system and of its total budget.

• Main specs involve noise, power gain, minimum signal power (sensitivity) and
linearity (distortion).

• Let us discuss these parameters (specs) one by one and identify their trade-offs.

Noise Performance
No Output
Noise = A2 No + Nckt
Ro
A
Vs Nckt

Where Nout = A2 No + Nckt is the output noise density, No is the noise from the input
source resistance, A is the voltage gain, and Nckt is the circuit generated noise density.
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Observe that the input-referred noise density is

N out N ckt
N inp ,ref = = N o +
A2 A2

N inp ,ref ↓ for A ↑

Signal to Noise Ratio (S/N) is a key parameter in the system and circuit design.
A figure of merit to evaluate S/N is the so called noise factor (F). F measures the
amount of noise produced by an RF device relative to the ambient thermal noise
at its input, and is defined as the ratio
total output noise power N out A2 N o + N ckt
F= = 2 =
output noise due to the input source A No A2 N o

N ckt
F =1+
A2 N o
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Note that F can be also expressed as a function of Ninp,ref as

⎛ N out ⎞ 1 N inp ,ref

F =⎜ 2 ⎟ =
⎝ A ⎠ No No

The noise figure (NF) is often defined as the noise factor in units of dB.

NF = 10 log F

NF is often used to characterize the S/N at the output and input port. Thus one can
rewrite F as
N out N out Si A2 N out Si
F = 2 (1) = 2 =
A No A N o So N o So

⎛ Si ⎞
⎜ ⎟
N
F =⎜ o ⎟ = SNRi
⎜ So ⎟ SNRo
⎜ ⎟
⎝ N out ⎠
Where Si and So are the input and output signal power, respectively.
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 NOISE FIGURE OF CASCADE SYSTEMS
Nin N2 Nout
A1, Nckt1 A2, Nckt2 An, Ncktn
N1

Nin, N1, . . Nout are the noise at the input, output block 1, … and the output
block n, respectively. Note that Nin= No.

N1 = A12 N in + N ckt1 = N o A12 + N ckt1

N 2 = N1 A22 + N ckt 2 = A22 A12 N o + A22 N ckt1 + N ckt 2
⋅
⋅
N out = An2 An2−1 L A22 A12 N o + An2 An2−1 L A22 N ckt1
+ An2 An2−1 L A32 N ckt 2 + L + An2 N ckt n −1 + N ckt n

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Thus, the input referred noise due to N1, N2, . . Nn becomes

N out
N inp ,ref =
A12 A22 L An

Observe that we have assumed that the input noise of the ith stage comes from the
input resistance of ith stage and this quantity is “No” for all stages, thus Ninp,ref
can be expressed as:

⎛ N N N ⎞
N inp ,ref = ⎜⎜1 + 2ckt1 + 2 ckt2 2 + L + 2 2 cktn 2 ⎟⎟ N o
⎝ A1 N o A1 A2 N o A1 A2 L An N o ⎠
and
N N
Ftotal = inp ,ref ; F1 = 1 + 2ckt1
No A1 N o
Furthermore notice that
N
F2 = 1 + 2ckt 2
A2 N o
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Then

N ckt 2 = ( F2 − 1) A22 N 0

Similarly for Nckt3, . . Ncktn, then the noise factor can be expressed as:

F2 − 1 F3 − 1 Fn − 1
Ftotal = F1 + + + L +
A12 A12 A22 A12 A22 ⋅ ⋅ An2−1
Note that Ai2 can be related to power gains, Gi , for a certain resistance i.e., R s = 50Ω.

EXAMPLE
LNA Mixer

ADC
+ Filter

If the NF and gain of the blocks are:

LNA: 20dB gain, 3dB NF (A12, NF1)
Mixer: 10dB gain, 10 dB NF (A22, NF2)
VGA + Filter: 80dB gain, 20 dB NF (A32, NF3) 7
 F2 − 1 F3 − 1
Ftotal = F1 + 2
+ 2 2
A1 A1 A2

9 99
Ftotal = 1.99526 + + = 2.18426
100 100.10

NFtotal = 3.39 dB

Notice that the additional blocks have deteriorated the LNA NF by about 0.4 dB.

Exercise. Repeat the NFtotal calculation with a new LNA with NF of 2.55 dB and a
gain of 12 dB. How is the NFtotal compared with previous case?

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 Input Noise Power Density (No)
Rs Rs

Noisy
*N Noiseless
Vs Vs 0
R=Rs
Noiseless

N o = kTo = (1.38 × 10− 23 J K )(290 K ) = 400.2 × 10− 23 J = −203.4dBW / Hz

No is in watts per hertz, and can be expressed in dBm for room temperature (290oK),
and a BW of 1Hz as

N o ( N in )dBm = −174 dBm

Thus, the minimum power signal that can be detected properly by a receiver is
(Nin)dBm; with a signal having the same power as the input noise. The available noise
power is defined as
PN o = kTo Δ f = N o Δ f
or
PN o
No =
Δf 9
SENSITIVITY
This parameter is specified for each communication standard. Sensitivity (Smin) is
the minimum signal power applied to the receiver input terminals that yields the
required output signal-to-noise ratio.

(S min )dBm = (N in )dBm + (NF )dB + (10 log BW )dB + (Prediction S/N )dB

• Nin is the input noise power density (No) produced on the source resistor feeding
the receiver. This might come from the input resistor of an input signal generator
used for lab testing or from the equivalent resistance from the antenna.

N in = kTo watts × Hz

N in = N o

( N in )dBm = −174dBm
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• Noise Figure (NF)dB
( NF )dB = (S N ) dB - (S N ) dB
input output

( NF )dB is the overall noise figure of the receiver.

• Bandwidth BW

The maximum attainable sensitivity depends on the bandwidth of the modulated

signal, since a narrower receiver bandwidth will distort the demodulated signal,
causing intersymbol interference and increasing the bit error rate (BER) in
digital communications and degrading fidelity and intelligibility of analog
signals.
The BW is mainly determined by IF filter and the commercial SAW resonators.

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Predetection Signal-to-Noise Ratio

This term is the SNR needed for a specified BER. For FM analog detection, the
required (signal + noise+ distortion)/(noise + distortion) in dB is often specified as
the performance criterion.

EXAMPLE: Consider the following receiver architecture with the individual specs
shown for each flock. G’s represent the power gains.

G3 = 8dB S
= 8.5dB
NF3 = 10dB GW = 300 KHz N
LNA BPF1 BPF2 IF Filter BPF3 Detector
Data
G1 = 15dB G2 = 3dB G4 = 6dB NF 5 = 10dB
NF1 = 2.5dB

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ELEN 665 (ESS), TAMU

The noise factor for the first 5 building blocks can be expressed as:

F2 − 1 F3 − 1 F4 − 1 F5 − 1
Ftotal = F1 + + + +
G1 G1G2 G1G2G3 G1G2G3G4

Substituting the parameters (not in dBs)* in the above expression yields:

Ftotal = 2.42 and NF = 3.8 dB

In the sensitivity (TOTAL) expression, the BW term yields:

10 log (3 × 105 ) = 54.8 dB Hz

(Smin )dBm = −174 + 3.8 + 54.8 + 8.5 = −106.9 dBm

* Gi ( B )
F = 10 NF / 10
; Gi = 10 10 13
References

[1] W. F. Egan, “ Practical RF System Design”, John Wiley & Sons 2003
[2] W. Shen, A. Emira, and E. Sánchez-Sinencio, “CMOS RF Receiver System
Design: A Systematic Approach” IEEE Transaction on Circuits and Systems I:
Regular Papers: Volume: 53, Issue 5, pp. 1023-1034, May 2006.
[3] A. Emira, A. Valdes-Garcia, Xia Bo, A.N. Mohieldin, A.Y. Valero-Lopez,
S.T. Moon, C. Xin, and E. Sánchez-Sinencio, “Chameleon: A Dual Mode
802.11b/Bluetooth Receiver System Design” IEEE Transaction on Circuits and
Systems I: Regular Papers: Volume: 53, Issue 5, pp. 992-1003, May 2006.
[4] M. El-Nozahi, K.Entesari, E. Sánchez-Sinencio, "A Systematic System-Level
Design Methodology for Dual-Band CMOS RF Receivers", 50th IEEE Midwest
Symposium on Circuits and Systems, pp. 1014-1017, Aug. 2007

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